Getting “help”

I’ve all but given up on making this blog useful, apologies if you came here expecting something helpful.

I had another psychiatrist appointment last week. I faced the dilemma that many people with mental illness have to deal with; whether to say the right things, jump through their metaphorical hoops and and take the easy way out, or whether to face up to the hard task of telling it how it is and facing the consequences of that. Last time I took the first approach, she seemed quite pleased with the progress I was making. In the days leading up to my latest appointment though, I’ve been feeling extremely hopeless and suicidal again. It often seems to disappear as soon as I get the chance to talk to someone about it and I feel like I’m being overly dramatic by bringing it up but this time I was determined to speak the truth about it.

I haven’t been feeling the desperation that I did before, I don’t feel the need to go out there this minute and do it, it’s more of a realisation what my life is going to be like. The horrible truth hangs over me every day, reinforced more and more with every failed social interaction, every rejection, every person staring and laughing. I feel crushing jealousy as I see people with friends, even glancing at groups studying together brings out a great sadness in me. I am totally alone here, and everywhere except in my home. I can no longer see how I’m going to get past the fact that I am hopelessly socially retarded, my appearance scares people and I am incredibly boring. There’s too much to overcome before anyone would even be remotely interested in knowing me, never mind the fact that I’ve already established myself as the weirdo loner here. It could be worse, at least I know a couple of people’s names, but I never dare interrupt their groups to talk to them, even if I could think of something to say.

I managed to tell the psychiatrist that I have been having the thoughts again and then of course I had to talk to the terrifying consultant. He’s incredibly intense, always staring and picks apart everything you say. I already over analyse the way I say every single thing to make sure it’s no misinterpreted but he sends me into overdrive. It can take me 30 seconds to answer a simple question, I get scared he’s going to get angry at what I say, especially after he smashed his fist on the table after I deigned to ask about anti-anxiety medication. The end result of it all was that he didn’t seem to think I was serious about it and just upped my venlafaxine to 225mg and said I’d benefit from one to one psychotherapy. I was referred a couple of months ago but still haven’t heard anything.

I don’t know what to do with myself now. I wish it was possible to transfer a confident person into my situation (of course no normal person would be in this position in the first place) and see what they’d do. I simply have no idea. I could carry on going to lectures, sitting alone and speaking to no-one for practically the entire week. I’m scared of the people my flatmates bring around here, I’ve missed several meals because I’ve been too afraid to leave my room and go into the loud, social atmosphere of the kitchen.

I’m so screwed up, laughter scares me now. If I here a group of people (especially men) laughing it just triggers a fear response inside me. I suppose it’s some kind of Pavlovian response after all the years of mocking and torment but I wish I didn’t feel like it. I don’t have a clue how I’m ever going to be normal*.

* Now I know the usual response to this is that “nobody is normal” or normal people aren’t interesting, but that’s not what I mean. I think most people would agree it is pretty normal to have at least one friend. It’s reasonably normal to be capable of going out somewhere without being crippled by fear of being laughed at and humiliated. I’d love to have someone to talk to, who I didn’t feel like I had to put on a show just to seem like less of a freak to.

I was asked some difficult questions by the consultant; “Have you ever had any close friends?” Not since I was a young child. He asked about when I was about 15; “Lads have mates who they go out and do ‘lad’ things with” he said. Not me. I had people I hung around with in school because I was too scared to leave them (they bullied me as much or worse than the other people) but I never had the slightest desire to spend any more time than absolutely necessary with them. I never saw them outside of school. I’ve been a loner for the vast majority of my life, but that isn’t how I want to be. I’d say the problem is probably made worse by two enormous problems. First, I am not the kind of person people like. I’m no fun to be around, I’m far too quiet and I don’t like drunkenness and parties, I look hideous, I’m probably too arrogant and élitist in my own introverted way. Second, I lack the basic skills that seem to come naturally to other people, probably through trial and error when they were younger and social faux-pas weren’t as heavily punished. I find it incredibly hard to explain just how little I know about how to interact with people, a lot of people think they are “shy” or whatever, but I’ve not come across many as socially maladjusted as me. I know nothing about what people do, I know they don’t spend every waking hour reading or on the computer like me but all I have for reference is what I see on TV and in movies (which I do realise aren’t realistic, by the way). I feel completely out of place as a human adult.

Outsider

I’ve found myself in a familiar place here, on the outside. Since I started high school I’ve never really belonged to any particular group. I never fit into any of the “cliques” or whatever the name for them is these days. I wasn’t a goth, skater, popular or any other easily defined type of person. I didn’t even fit in with the nerds. Back in those days I used to tell myself that I was happier and better off alone, after all they were just acting that way to fit in with each other, the phonies. In a way I was happier, avoidance let my escape the anxiety which I dreaded so much but it left me without any proper friends or connections.

Here, it hasn’t taken long for me to become the odd one out. I don’t go out to clubs etc so I don’t fit in here either. I suppose it doesn’t help that I am incredibly quiet and also older than my other flatmates but I did initially make the effort to try and get to know them, however that has not gone well. I can talk to them in passing and I’ve even had short conversations with them when I’ve seen them alone but I can’t participate in group discussions so I’m effectively frozen out. I’d like to be friends with them, but we don’t really have anything at all in common.

So out of practice am I, that I doubt that I will make any friends here at all. I’ve already embarrassed myself by trying to speak to someone in my class who also looked to be by themselves and the only other person whose name I know and have spoken too reminded me too much of my old “friends” from school. I don’t want to be in that situation again where I am made to feel stupid for actually wanting to work, and having my notes copied and all that. I desperately want to try my hardest to do well in this degree and I don’t want it being spoiled by another person who thinks they’re “too cool for school” and mocks people for working hard. I mean, what’s the point? Why pay all that money if you aren’t going to concentrate?

I apologise for this incoherent ramble, I was woke up by water leaking into my room from the flat above so I’m not in the greatest of moods.

Leaving Home Part 2

Well I’m sorry it has taken so long to get around to writing this up, as you can imagine I have been extremely busy for the past week and I’m quite drained, both physically and especially mentally. First of all there was the extremely difficult process of moving all my stuff out and the anticipation of what my new home and room mates would be like. Will they like me? What if they make fun of me? Will I be able to manage without my mum?

Saying goodbye was very hard, my mum ended up crying like I expected. I didn’t want her to hang around too long because I know she was going to be upset. Some people’s parents seemed to stay for almost the entire day. After I’d unpacked my stuff, I decided to venture out into the kitchen/common area to meet my other room mates (I’d said hello to a couple of them while unloading the car). It took me a while to psych myself up enough to go in there but I made it. There were loads of people in there, more than the amount who would be in our apartment so I was a bit confused at first since I wasn’t sure who was staying and who wasn’t. I managed to introduce myself and talk a little bit to some of them. I later found out that most people already had friends here, that they had either worked with, known from college or were already friends with. This made me feel a bit sad because I had tried to console myself with the fact that we’d all be in the same boat, i.e. everyone would be on their own and not already have a social group, but this wasn’t the case. Already I was a loner and everyone had got a group of friends.

We all went out together on the first night. It was the first time I’d ever done anything like this, we went to a couple of pubs first which I didn’t mind too much and I managed to chat to them for a little while. Later on when we went to the club though, I just couldn’t stand it. There were too many drunk people and it was so packed, I felt trapped. I stayed for about an hour but when they all went to dance, I couldn’t handle it any more and I had to leave early. I felt so bad for running out on them like that but there was no way I could handle it any more and I didn’t fancy standing about on my own at the side all night long. I ended up leaving them a note explaining that I get panicked in situations like that and why I can’t drink etc. Maybe it was a bad idea, but I didn’t know what else to do.

The next day, no-one was mean to me about it so I guess they understood or at least didn’t hold it against me. They asked me to come to dinner with them which I did and had a good time, felt much better after that. I didn’t go to town with them afterwards though, I think they realise that I am not into clubs and stuff now.

All in all, I think I have been very lucky to be put with this group, they all seem to be nice and even though they are all very confident and outgoing, I have managed to talk to them a little bit and I think we get on alright. I find it much easier to speak to people individually rather than in a group, it’s so intimidating being with a bunch of such loud people.

I think that overall I am coping ok so far. The course starts properly on Monday which I’m looking forward too, the introductory lectures I’ve had so far have been interesting and the course sounds really good. The lecturers are very enthusiastic and involved which is a refreshing change from college where they didn’t bother to turn up a lot of the time.

I wanted to let people know how I’m getting on so far. I’m actually at home for the weekend at the moment so I am a bit more relaxed and should hopefully be able to write a bit more later on. Thanks everyone for all the encouragement and support

The Night Before

Tonight is the last night that I will sleep in my bed, in this house where I have been since 1991. I have no idea how long I’ll last at university, maybe only a matter of days, but tomorrow I will be there. Obviously I am nervous, most people in this situation would be, let alone those with anxiety but I’m not in full on panic mode. Hopefully this will last long enough for me to get some sleep, though I’m not counting on it.

My first anxious thought about things is to do with the amount of stuff I’m taking. It seems like I have an awful lot of boxes and bags, although I have only got the essential stuff (we need to take all of our own kitchen stuff like pots, pans, plates, cutlery etc) and clothes, a few books and my laptop. I don’t want people to laugh at me for bringing huge amounts or to make fun of the stuff I have  

I have more to write but I can’t concentrate very well at the moment. I may write more later on.

Crisis Team

Just had the visit from 2 crisis team workers that I wrote about earlier. It wasn’t too bad, I said and heard a lot of things that I have done before and now I can’t help but feel I have wasted their time. I could’ve done with talking to them a couple of weeks ago really when I was at my lowest point. It’s probably bad of me, but I held back some of the truth about my suicidal thinking, but then I can’t really describe it properly anyway. I don’t know how everyone else thinks, but for me there is never one consistent mode of thinking or conscious thoughts that can easily be put into words. I don’t sit there and think “I might throw myself off a bridge tonight”, it’s more of an overall feeling that comes in waves.

At the moment I’m not seriously planning anything for the very near future, but those thoughts and feelings are still in the back of my mind. For now I am going to try and last the next week and see how things go at university if I can. It’s probably not knowing how I am going to be received by people that is causing me the most anxiety, after all it is 2 years since I met a new group of people whom I had not spoken to and got to know on the internet first.

How I got on

The appointment was surprisingly short, I spent most of the time there sitting around in a tiny waiting room trying to avoid catching peoples eye. The first doctor I saw was a junior psychiatrist, she asked me the usual questions that I’ve been asked many times before about my anxiety symptoms etc. I asked about diazepam but nothing came of it unfortunately. After talking about my suicidal feelings, she decided to discuss with the consultant and then asked me to come and talk to him. He was very intimidating, I felt like I was being interrogated. This just made me anxiety worse, I stumbled over words and my mind went blank several times but I think I managed to get my point across. There was a particularly painful moment when he asked if I had any close friends or girlfriend, to which I answered truthfully; no, and then he asked “Why not?”. My mind was overcome with all the hatred I have for myself and if I wasn’t so tongue tied with anxiety, I could probably have spent half an hour listing the many reasons why not. Eventually though I had to settle with “probably because I am so weird” which led to further questioning about why I think that, and of course why I think that I look weird which I couldn’t answer because I felt tears coming to my eyes. Thankfully he stopped the interrogation at that point and asked me to wait outside while he talked to the original doctor.

I went back to see her and apparently they are concerned about me, maybe it was the way I answered their questions because I was not feeling actively suicidal like I was the last time I saw my MHP who just sent me on my merry way. The outcome of it all is that I have got to have someone from the crisis team visit me at home today, which I didn’t really want but I couldn’t bring myself to argue with them about that. They also changed my medication to venlafaxine, an SNRI so hopefully that might make a slight difference though I am not expecting miracles.

I had hoped that I could relax slightly after the appointment was done but now I have to worry about this person coming round. Of course I had to tell my mum, but I didn’t say why they were coming exactly because I don’t want her to know how close I was to killing myself. She’s now gone on a mad cleaning spree that usually happens whenever we are expecting visitors. I just hope that she will give me some privacy because I don’t want her listening to me talk about such personal and potential hurtful things.