It’s hard to describe that moment when you feel like you’re not yourself. It creeps up on you. I can’t pinpoint the moment that I knew I was depressed. There were so many events, signs and symptoms, it crept up on me like a spider seeking shelter from the rain running across the floor when you least expect it.
It was a gradual build up. A lack of ambition at work due to a previous event and family illness. Not to mention the crippling break down of my ten year relationship with the man I still love, it took me a long time to see that I wasn’t right. We’d become stagnant, two ships passing in the night. Shift work had played a part and though we didn’t have particularly stressful jobs, the stress of life had gotten to us. Both of us craved solitude and that’s we got. Alone. While I knew, he deeply loved me, he wasn’t a part of my life anymore. We wanted different things and as wrenching as it was, it was time to go our separate ways.
It wasn’t obvious to begin with how much pain I had caused myself. All I knew was, I felt dead inside. My future husband and father of my children had all but disappeared. To try and compensate for the void, I threw myself even more into anything that would block out the mental pain. Physical pain was so much more tolerable. I could punish myself in so many ways, pushing my body to it’s limit. I’d walk, swim, and run and do anything to myself that meant I didn’t have to think. If I could make my body ache, then it would give my mind a rest. I wanted to push myself so hard that I’d drop dead. It was like standing over the abyss to hell, do I jump or wait until I’m pushed? I wanted to punish every thing about me. My weight, my appearance, my attitude. I didn’t like who I was, but then, I didn’t who I was.
Days would go by and the only communication I could bare was messaging one of my dearest follows on twitter. Sadly, he bore the ugly brunt of my horrible irrational screwed up mind and to this day, I still haven’t forgiven myself. My words will haunt me forever.
I took myself to the brink of death. Going over all the negatives in my life was like watching a horror film of yourself and not being able to look away. Night time was the worst. Not being able to sleep because your head is being wrapped in poison ivy. It wraps itself around you and infiltrates your mind and you slowly suffocate. I wanted out. I wanted out of the ivy and out of this world. I’d planned everything. Where I would go, what I would write. The small pink pot of potassium tablets next to my bed would be my get of jail free card. It was like a relief to know if all the shit got too much, I could end it all. I’d think of them and then rationalise my argument as to why I should take them. Except there’s nothing rational at all about taking ones life and I knew it. The guilt and selfishness haunted me. My support worker would urge me to go to A & E if my thoughts got worse. But how could I?
I’ve worked on the frontline of the NHS. I’ve seen the kind of people that need a & e. How on earth could I justify turning up to an understaffed department and tell them I wanted to die? I could imagine myself lying on a trolley when there were people there fighting to live and here I am wishing myself to die. Those people would give anything to have my life and I wanted to end it. How could I be so selfish to be in the same place?
The one thing I’d lost was my fear. I was no longer scared of anything. My desire to die meant I’d lost my fear of dying. I craved anything that put me at risk. I wanted anything that would potentially kill me or hurt me. I wanted to take the pain away that I couldn’t describe. The hollow dull ache from a soulless body. Maybe it was a turning point for me. Maybe I could do all things that scared me before but still live to tell the tale. I’d always wanted a tattoo but my partner hated them. I wanted a nose piercing too and he hated that. What was stopping me now? I have no one but myself to answer to and anything that can take the pain away is always a good thing in my book.
So, the next stage: tattoo and nose ring. If I’m going to live, it’s by my rules. I’m changing. Hopefully for the better. Lady Wood 2.0
Twitter @specsygurl
tetheredinthedeepend 