All Is Not Well In The State Of Geordie Land

Life is not good with me.

At present I am posting from the PatientLine system above my hospital bed. I have taken an overdose. The second one is 48 hours. I discharged myself against medical advice on Saturday morning whilst still tachycardic and then was readmitted last night after taking more tablets.

I cannot cope with my life anymore. The boyfriend and I are no longer. I don’t want to go into details as I know a lot of you know who he is, but suffice to say I haven’t taken it well. He was perfectly pleasant about it, I just turned into a borderline bitch. I feel once again as if I am on my own. We have agreed to stay friends, indeed I am going to go up and see him late next week, but I’m not sure how painful I will find that. I truly loved him. More than I have loved anyone in my life. And it’s hard to get over that, but I am sure I will.

I am scheduled for more chemo tomorrow but at present they’re not sure whether I’ll be well enough or not. Part of me hopes I’m not. They’re keeping me in ’till at least early afternoon and getting a psych SHO to assess me. I don’t need a psych assessment I know why I did it. I am a borderline cow who reacts badly to every situation and her response to everything bad that happens is to overdose or cut herself.

I am now resigned to being borderline all my life. I missed an appointment with my psych last week because I went out drinking after school. I was quite drunk when she rang me out of concern at half six. However, I sent her an email and decided to be honest with her. it’s copied under the cut.

And The Days Just Keep Dragging On

I had the blood tests on Monday to see if I can have the chemotherapy. There is a part of me that wants them to find I have a strange White Blood Cell count, or a rampaging infection, or am anaemic, just so I can delay the treatment. However, I know I am none of the above so I find out tomorrow when I am to start having chemotherapy.

On Tuesday I have a medical wonderland day. I see the orthopod in the early evening about my foot after the operation whereupon I will mention to him that I still have no sensation around the scar or below it and I will say how much it hurts. At lunchtime I am seeing the substance misuse people at Plummer Court which I am scared about. It is only for an assessment but I am scared they will either make too much out of it or dismiss me. I am also terrified that they’ll take one look at me and my background and jump to a stereotypical conclusion that I’m “not the sort of girl who has a drug problem”.

We’ll see.

Sorry this is so short but just can’t be bothered writing at the moment. Everything just seems a little too much effort.

Ruth

 

Belated Merry Christmas

I have come out of hiding now that Christmas is over. I quite like New Year, well I like drinking and partying ’till the wee small hours, but I don’t like Christmas.

 It was even worse this year as I ended back in hospital again just before Christmas. I collapsed and ended up being admitted overnight, the doctors’ think it was a combination of adverse side effects of the beta-blocker my psych started me on and a very low potassium level (due to vomiting). I’m OK now though.

As for life in general, I am attending the local day hospital on weekdays in the mornings to have an assessment over a longer period that can be sent to the substance misuse people in the new year. I am still taking my meds and I haven’t self-harmed in a while. I am sticking to only taking 4 sleeping tablets a week (mainly because my Mum dishes them out to me) but what she (and the professionals) don’t know is the amount of OTC sleeping aids I take on the other 3 nights a week. My codeine use has decreased but not gone away. In fact it seems to be a lot more sporadic and impulsive, which I’m not sure is a good or bad thing.

London is grey, wet and miserable. I’ve already vowed to myself to go on a long walk tomorrow and take some photos of the city. I love taking photos, I’m not particularly good at it, but I love it and it dawned on me that I have hardly any photos of the city I have lived in for all of my life (exclusing my under-graduate years) so I hope to remedy that one.

Ruth

I Think I Can Honestly Say “I’m Doing OK”

And it’s the first time in weeks I’ve been able to say, or even think that.

I am at home, with the parents (who are, possibly quite rightly, being incredibly over-protective). I am staying here until 9am tomorrow morning, when I return to the mental health unit. I have been on leave since midday on Saturday and have loved and hated being away from the unit. Part of me is scared of being in the outside world again, there is a part of me that still wants to flee to far-flung places and start a new life, or that wants to curl up under the duvet with a bottle of cheap gin/vodka/whiskey/rum (delete as applicable), or wants to slice myself to pieces. But then there is a part of me that wants to go back to university in January (I originally deferred for a year, but after talking to my tutor and explaining everything he is offering the opportunity to return to studies in January, if I want to).

They are thinking of discharging me sometime early next week. The operation on my arm went well, although it will take some time to see if the nerve is beginnning to knit back together and fix itself. My new psychiatrist is trying me on new medication. I am off the lithium and onto lamotrigine (I have taken it in the past and it worked well). I am on a new dose of venlafaxine (150mg b.d.) which is an increase, but should take it into more of a therapeutic range for the noradrenaline reuptake. I am off the temazepam and zopiclone and onto zolpidem (as a short term fix). I am also being referred to the substance misuse people within the trust, who apparently run a women’s only service as outpatients, and am due to have a meeting with someone about that soon. I am getting a CPN, as it has been decided that I will live with my parents in West London for the foreseeable future, even if I return to uni, and will be meeting them sometime after I am discharged. Plus, when I am discharged I will be under the care of the crisis team daily for the first week.

This all feels very strange, but it is nice to know that there is support in place.

Ruth