The Return!

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Hello to you all!

It has been a while since I posted anything here and a whole host of things have happened. For a brief catchup on those thing, feel free to check out my videos over on my YouTube channel, where I will soon be uploading new videos. 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR0rjjCNXgX89MfQl-PGZzg/feed?activity_view=3

Since you last read about my life, I have been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disroder, I have been taken advantage of and raped, faced homelessness having to live in a B&B, had to call 999 and spend a morning in A&E and moved into a new flat just before Christmas. It has been quite a ride.

Firstly, I'd like to say that I couldn't have survived any of that without my friends or the support of Croydon Drop-In. Now I have Family Mosaic to add to the list because they're another invaluable organisation. 

As of the stroke of midnight I am 23 days self-harm free. This is a huge achievement for me. I aim to make it to 31 days. Then 2 months. It's an ongoing battle but I'm willing to fight it. 

I shall be back soon to talk to you some more!

Stay safe 

:) x

An Incoming Storm.

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There's an incoming storm today though the sky is full of bright, yellow light and it would seem as if all hope were housed in the sunshine. I did some Feng Shui stuff to my room this weekend and made it into a much more productive space for working and relaxing. The sun now shines upon my face. An hour ago this would have made for a very different picture than it does now. I was happy an hour ago that I had completed so much in a few hours of being awake and I was beating depression's ass quite well. Having been downstairs and mentioned one tiny thing about a police woman and a video statement to my house mate; she launched into a story about the film she had seen the night before on the television - long story short - there's incest. I got the full and detailed description from my house mate. Why? I didn't ask for that. 

When faced with somebody who opens up a little bit about their own life; people just shouldn't assume that it means they want to hear about other people who suffered the same or worse. That doesn't help. I feel guilty and sick about my own life. I lived through my own nightmare growing up and I still live through it now due to my PTSD. I feel guilty that my pain takes up NHS funding to deal with it when somebody else could have that help. I don't need to hear about other people being abused. It's abhorrent that it happens to anybody at all. The worst nightmare children should have to deal with is a monster under the bed; nothing more.

Telling me a story about abuse when I'm questioning my entire childhood doesn't help. I feel sick. I feel worthless. The only thing that I can succeed at right now is to cut my wrist. I don't want to but this pain in my chest is overwhelming and the only way that I know to get rid of it is to cut. Old scars become new scars. Emotional pain becomes physical pain. Physical pain is easy to deal with. 

"I use pain to deal with pain." ~4

Freedom.

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I was free from The Monster for 8 days. They were long days and I heard him tapping away in my head but I ignored him. Sometimes, it was really difficult. I thought that having a friend to stay would make it easier but it turns out that it was much harder than I thought. I’ve waited to write this because I wasn’t sure of the words to say about it. I loved having the company. I loved that there was somebody there worrying about me and that I was accountable to another human being so I couldn’t just cave in to The Monster or go for a walk to shut him up. Much as I loved it, I was always anxious. When you’re depressed, a whole day can seem like a lifetime sometimes and a week can feel like an eternity. I don’t know how to express how grateful I am that I had one of my best friends here for that long; Lord knows she got the raw end of the deal with the things she had to listen to and we know it’s never fun hanging out with somebody who is depressed. I am truly grateful; I am. But The Monster in my head is pissed off. I couldn’t find the words before to say how difficult it is to hold it together for somebody else.

During those 8 days, I had laughs and food and I made it to all of my appointments. I spent time doing things with another living person instead of sitting alone in my room. I barely slept though and if I did sleep; it was at the wrong times and for the wrong reasons. I remember not wanting to wake her up because she needed to sleep. I remember staring at my anti-depressants and just wishing for a quick end and for my head to stop causing so much torment when I had exactly what I wanted; a friend and to not be alone. It just wouldn’t stop. Bang, bang, bang. Over and over again with no reprieve. I stared at the spot where I knew my razor blade was. I longingly looked at it. I couldn’t touch it. It wouldn’t be very fair to let her wake up the next day and find me in a worse mess than before she went to sleep. So I sat in my tent. I rocked backwards and forwards. I cried as silently as I could. I tried not to let on how tired I was or how scared I was that the minute she left I would cave.

One day, she went to see a friend in London. That was a difficult day for me because I knew even before she left what I wanted to do and what I thought I deserved to do. I didn’t do it. The guilt that I thought I would feel to see her face if she came back and I’d cut myself was worse than the guilt I was feeling. I hate myself but it’s not fair to make other people see the pain you’re in. I want to, all of the time I want to prove just how much it hurts and that’s why it’s a compulsion to cut or to be sick but it isn’t fair on other people. Being selfish, yes – there’s no way to avoid that but it can’t be seen and when it can be seen, it can’t be believed. For me; to commit suicide is to be selfless. My depression tells me that I am a burden on society. It tells me that I shouldn’t ask for help every week from a counsellor because maybe an 11 year old deserves the help more than I do. Maybe they’re not as messed up as me or maybe they didn’t do as many bad things as my depression tells me I did. So, for me, if I committed suicide, I would be saving a lot of people from a lot of bother. I already know I’ve had people walk out of my life because it was too difficult to be there. I don’t hold it against them. It’s hard to be a friend to somebody who is depressed because it’s relentless and it’s so damn repetitive and honestly, if I didn’t know what it was like to be this way and live like this, I probably wouldn’t want to try as hard as my friends do to be a friend to me. Depression is draining on everybody. It drains NHS money. It drains friendships and relationships. It drains the people that it affects. Mental Health issues are draining on our society and we’re told so many times to just, “get on with it”, “be happy”, “try harder”, “just stop being sad” and so we take the problem away. We kill ourselves to save you from being drained. Jesus died to forgive us our sins. We die so you don’t have to moan about money being spent on us instead of Cancer Care. We kill ourselves because life is miserable for us but we don’t want it to be miserable for you.

My friend went a few days ago. Predictably, she had been gone a few hours and I’d already cut myself. It was a release for me. Now, it is three days later and I can proudly say that I am self-harm free for my third day. This is an achievement for me at this present time. I do not care about the past right now and I do not care about the possible screw ups of the future. I am here and I am fighting; for my life, for the chance to have a future and to become a person who changes the lives of young people who think they are a drain on society (because they’re told they are). I don’t know if writing this here is the cowardly way of telling my best friend how difficult it was but keeping things bottled up never helps; something she tells me a lot and so here I am, baring the truth to her eternally in my writing.

The funny thing is, I know that she’s reading this and maybe she’s crying, maybe she’s not but I know for sure that she’s saying, “Why didn’t you just wake me up?” I couldn’t. It’s easier to share how bad things are and how I’ve done silly things when I’m typing it. It takes more courage to tell somebody in person and I’m still fresh off my breaking down in front of the counsellor suicidal night and the memories of being so pathetic that don’t fill me with pride.

I’m lucky, really. I have friends who will stand by me no matter what. They may not always understand but they stick by my side and do what they can to make me see the good in the world; the good in myself. Thank You, All <3.

This is the end of my third self-harm free day. I am free right now. I am alive.

Too Strong For Too Long.

******TRIGGER WARNING******

I used to worry about receiving letters in the post because they’re almost always referring to my inability to manage my life; overdrawn in this account, owing on that account, you still haven’t paid your phone bill, blah, blah, blah. I’m not sure I even worry about that stuff anymore; I’ve just sort of accepted that’s the way it is. Now, I get letters telling me to make doctor’s appointments, to visit the hospital for an endoscopy, to visit a therapist and while we’re at it, let’s get you to visit some other clinician just for good measure. The simple truth is that I am absolutely lousy at managing my own life and looking after myself. I think there are some people who would argue against this because I’m still alive and that should be proof enough that I am doing quite alright at life but I’m inclined to disagree.

The doctor is sending me to the hospital for an urgent endoscopy. Sometimes, when the emotions become too much and I have to get rid of things I try to be sick whether I’ve eaten enough or not. Sometimes, it’s not even that I’ve binged but I feel entirely worthless so I make myself sick anyway, only there’s nothing to come up. Sometimes blood comes up and it’s fresh but I’d just been ignoring it because that seemed to be easier. I didn’t want to admit to myself that things had become worse and I didn’t want to admit it to my doctor; every time I see her, it’s like we both realise I’m slipping further and further while trying to maintain some sense of normality for the outside world. I wonder if she worries about me ending up in hospital as much as I do. Today was no exception; concern was etched on her face as plainly as the scars on my arm. I should have been more worried myself. I should have taken it as a sign to stay together. I failed.

My fight and flight response is completely erratic right now. I recognised the threat and perceived it to be just as damaging as taking a knife to my skin; my constant throwing up has maybe caused a tear somewhere and that would explain the blood. I understand that threat and the fear of having an endoscopy is great, most definitely not something I would like to experience at all and I can only imagine how badly my panic will hit the roof. I fear it will never stop. I know the procedure and it looks scary. Considering the amount of times I’ve made myself sick, you’d think the idea of having a camera down my throat wouldn’t be that scary but I can just imagine now how panicked I will be and I’ll most likely choke. Maybe I’ll choke to death. Who knows?

 I should have eaten my food and taken my tablets straight away. I got scared, really scared. In trying to avoid the rising fear and panic in my head, I did exactly what I wasn’t supposed to. I made myself sick. I took my water into the bathroom. I was in there for over half an hour and it was far from pleasant. Why did I do this? I don’t understand it? I don’t want this at all. What’s wrong with me? I didn’t just drink the water to ready myself, to give my stomach some more incentive to let the food freely flow back up. I didn’t just clench my stomach muscles. I didn’t just put my fingers down my throat and push. I kept pushing. Methodically, I pushed and pushed. *Drink, clench, fingers in throat, clench, push, choke*. This repeated. Sometimes when I’m making myself sick, I get so frustrated that nothing is coming back up that I just abandon the quest. Today scared me though. I can remember my thoughts and the conversation that happened, the argument that took place but whether it was between Me and The Monster, I don’t know. Maybe it was just Me arguing with Me. I don’t know which is more frightening, which saddens me more, which threatens my existence. If I’m fighting myself then I don’t see how I can win.

“There’s nothing there.”

“So, try harder.”

“Why?”

“That’s just how it works.”

“But I can’t bring anything up.”

“You can if you push. Just keep pushing.”

“Well, what if I’m too tired? What if I don’t have the energy to push anymore? What if I just want to give up?”

“Then you’re even failing at having an eating disorder. Are you actually being sick? Or are you pretending? Is this a problem? Do you hate the way you look? Do you hate that you’re incredibly fat and disgusting? Did you come in here to actually be sick or to just play at being sick? You can’t play at having an eating disorder”

He’s right. So I pushed and pushed. Sure enough, if you keep pushing something it will always happen, for good or bad. Maybe it would be okay if I could rationalise it to think that I’m getting rid of the bad parts of me but I’m not. I’m still full of hatred and anger. I’m still full of the person that other people walk away from. I’m still full of the ‘me’ that I hate. Still full of the ‘me’, who pushes and pushes until people leave and then she just moans and moans. I hear myself crying all the time, “feel sorry for me, and help me, please!”

Why? Why should anybody help? It’s my fault I’m being sick. I’m making myself sick. That’s not normal. It’s disgusting. How could anybody respect this?

I just don’t understand myself anymore. I can’t even find the words to describe my own stupidity. My positivity jar says that I’m a loyal friend and I pride myself on that, I really do but how can I be a loyal friend if I’m not alive anymore? I’m scared that I’ll just keep pushing myself until I don’t exist anymore. Maybe I can save myself before that happens. I don’t want to be a friend who breaks promises and can’t save other people if she’s already dead.

I Cut and I Bleed

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            When I was a child and I heard the other kids in my class talk about people they knew that would ‘cut’ themselves; I never understood. I don’t think that I really knew what they meant. I saw how you could cut bread, meat, fish and even chocolate if you so wished but to cut yourself; that never made any sense to me. How do you go about doing that? Why would you do that? I had been hurt by somebody else every day for years; why would someone turn on themselves like that? For the longest time, I didn’t understand.

The day I wrote my teacher’s name on my left hand with my compass in maths was a day when I came close to understanding. Nothing seemed to make any sense to me right then. I had been told repeatedly to see my Head of Year every Tuesday at lunchtime so that she could make sure I was alright. I’m still not sure she really did anything beyond satisfying some small doubt within her. I’d already told her things were happening at home and nothing was done. I think this was my cry for help. I needed somebody to notice me; to see what was happening that I couldn’t voice. Telling the family secrets was and is forbidden; I’m sure they’ll come after me soon. I turned on myself in my time of need to show something concrete that the teachers could see. If they saw me doing this to myself, then maybe they’d believe what I was saying and I would get some help; somebody would take me away from that hellhole. But nobody did.

Now, I can see the beauty of cutting yourself. I have always loved colouring in. Cutting yourself is like colouring in your own body. There is a satisfaction in it that cannot adequately be explained. It was difficult for me the first few times that I cut myself. I didn’t know how to; how do you just go ahead and cut yourself? It’s not something that comes naturally when your every instinct is to protect your body from harm. I tried with scissors more than once but that doesn’t do a lot. It helped a little. I had some brief respite from the emotional pain ripping me apart.

It’s fascinating to me that a kitchen knife can so easily cut through an onion, with so many layers and a potato with such a solid interior but human skin? Human skin is tough; unyielding to the touch of the cool, steel blade. I cut at my arm like I would cut some bread but after an hour, I am still only just beneath the surface and it looks more like a burn than anything else. I did not realise than an hour had passed until the programme that I was watching finished. I had been methodically carving at my flesh, backwards and forwards; backwards and forwards. When the hour had passed, I put the knife away and I cleaned my cuts, bandaged my arm like anybody would. The black ball of pain inside of my heart had become a little smaller. It is harder to feel emotional pain when you have a pain that is physical; a pain that can be seen and understood by all and yet I had felt nothing when I cut into my arm so violently for so long. There was no pain. The physical pain had cancelled out the emotional pain and I was left hollow, like the tree hit by lightning with no hope of growth. I was there and I existed but I was not me. There was no feeling. There was no light and there was no dark. I existed but I saw nothing. I heard nothing. I was numb to the pain and numb to the world. I can only hope I passed out after that.

The real danger for me right now is that I am not frantic and I am not fidgety. I am calmly contemplating the next brutal act I will perform on myself at the bequest of My Monster. He has left me alone during the days and haunted my dreams with his face and his soul-destroying voice. He knows how to get to me. He knows that the intense fear will be greater inside me if I am calm when he speaks to me. I am better able to protect myself against him when I fidget because there is a part of me that is still in control; a part of me that knows cutting myself is stupid and wrong. When I am calm, I have already rationalised the act. I can see the relief from the pain that eats me alive; from the unheard cries caught in my throat. I can feel the horror swell within in me because I know what must be done and I know that it is well deserved for being such a failure; for being a disgrace to my family; for being born at all.

When I am calm, I welcome the sweet release of the blade against my flesh. I welcome the sight of the blood as it trickles down my arm and into the sink. As the blood mixes with the water, it swirls and the patterns that appear are pretty; worthy of being remembered, somebody should capture that moment. It does not scare me that I will lose blood and it does not scare me that I could go too far. Whatever happens will be whatever is deserved. There must always be blood loss in a war and while I cannot reach him to bleed him to the death he so surely deserves; the blood loss must be mine.

Trapped Cries

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“Shit! It’s raining!” is something I say far too much during the summer months and as luck would have it, my washing is predictably outside. As surely as my clothes become heavier with the dampening rain; my mood plummets. I race downstairs, throw my shoes on and rush into the oncoming torrent of pelting abuse the rain offers to me. There is no easy way to do this quickly. Grab clothing, unpeg on both sides, throw clothing into basket, throw pegs into bag, rinse and repeat the necessary amount of times. This process that I seem to fulfil every weekend during our delightful British weather casts my mood into a shadowy dungeon. I am easily frustrated as I try to hurry my movements; as I try to stop an oncoming panic attack. The rain drenches me like cancer overrides the body; quickly, angrily and with no reprieve in sight. I am wet enough to need a change of clothing and I’m not blind to the irony of the situation but it’s not funny. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the kitchen knife as I walk past the counter and I know there is a part of me that has been awakened by the fresh frustrations and this part of me now wants to cut.

There is no reason for me to blame myself for this new situation. The weather changes and it is sporadic at best in the UK. I know this. My mood so often shifts like the weather. It is so predictably unpredictable. - From sunny to stormy in a split second. The anger surges through me and it feels electric; I could spark an entire war with this anger that I feel. I cast aside my washing as I enter my room. There is no point in attempting to dry it here. This room cannot house such a saturated mess in need of such warmth. It is not lost on me that my clothes are now like my heart.

My legs shake violently as I try to maintain the composure to write this. Putting a barrier up to the anger is difficult and it requires so much of my strength that I am worried I will not stop the panic in time. I am panicking a lot. My plan for the washing did not go my way. I was taken out of my comfort zone as swiftly as ice melting in a fire and this panic, though familiar to me, is not something that I can suppress all that easily. It is a panic linked with my PTSD. Air rips through my body, grating at my insides as I try to breathe and with crushing speed, I am 12 years old again.

I am standing outside the back door of my childhood home in my swimming costume as the sun streams down on me. It is the first warm day in a while and the patio warms my bare feet. My swimming costume is a mixture of black and bright blue; my favourite colour. I’m excited to go in the pool that my Dad has put up in the back garden. I am happy. The weekend is here and I have done all of my homework and household chores. I can just swim in the pool and relax just like a normal 12 year old.

I don’t make it to the pool. My brother comes outside, which confuses me because I didn’t know that he was home. Maybe he just got back from somewhere. I don’t really know and I don’t really care. My brother and I argue an awful lot. I hate him; quite honestly not that anybody would see or believe that from me.

“Let’s play a game”, he says to me. I figure that’s okay because it’s sunny; maybe he wants to play a water game or something; I don’t even know what games you’d play in a pool this small. He is 15. I am 12. He goes back inside to the kitchen while I wait for him, longingly looking at the pool. The pool is always best on the first day that it is put up, before the flies have had their chance at swimming in it and the leaves have settled upon the glistening surface. When the pool is full of flies, it always reminds me of the outside swimming pools in France; they’re always full of unsuspecting, dead flies when we arrive for our holidays. That always makes me feel sick. Our pool isn’t like that today though. There are no flies. The water is unsullied; just waiting for me.

My brother comes back from the kitchen after a minute or two and he is holding the bag with the pegs in it. I am confused because I don’t know of a game you can play with pegs and we don’t have any washing to put on the line. I’m ready to swim in the pool; not play an imaginary game. I don’t ask him what the game is because I figure he’ll tell me soon and I’m not going to waste my words on this question. I stand and stare at him, waiting.

The game is not a game. The game is an act by him. He thinks that calling it a game makes it okay. “It’s only a game” is such a common phrase. This is not a game and this is not okay but my words are trapped in my throat and I don’t know how to escape from this. He is older than me and he is bigger than me. I have felt the sharp, quick thud of his trainers against my body before; his hands have struck me many times and I have no wish for this to be repeated. I am frozen in time. I am frozen and terrified. My breath catches.

“Let’s see how many pegs we can put on you”. He is smiling. This is not funny to me. I don’t want to smile. I don’t understand this. I’m pretty sure he shouldn’t be touching me there at all. I wasn’t sure when I was 6 or even when I was 10 but now I am 12 and I’m pretty sure this isn’t right. There is nothing that I can do though. I am powerless. There’s a question in my mind but it doesn’t invite the same excitement within me as it does him. I have a rising panic within me as I wonder how many pegs can be attached to my private parts. I do not ask why. I do not say no. I do not kick, scream, yell or fight against him. It is like I am drowning in quick sand with nobody to pull me out and no branch in sight.

“Lift your swimming costume out of the way, right there.”

“Hold this for me.”

“Just pull that out of the way while I put this here.”

“I said hold it out of the way! Don’t let go of it, idiot!”

“There. All finished. Let go of the skin now and let me count them.”

The answer is more than 10. The answer is that it hurts. I am mortified. I wish I could die right now. I do not want to be alive like this. He is proud of his achievement. He walks away, smiling; leaving me to shamefully remove these objects. I do not cry. I do not look. I take them off one by one; ignoring the pain. I wash them in the kitchen sink. I go to the toilet and I get on with my day.

This is one of those things that happen to me. There is nobody to ask for help. There is nothing to do but pretend it hasn’t bothered me.

I never stopped to think about my back garden being an open space. I didn’t stop to wonder if the people in the nursing home behind our house could see what happened or whether my neighbours were looking out of the window. There was a blind spot at my childhood house. If you were to stand on the patio in a certain place, you wouldn’t be seen by anybody looking out of any of the windows at the back of the house. We weren’t stood in that place. Anybody could have seen. But if anybody did; nobody did anything to help.