Age Old Doubt.

My holiday is drifting towards its inevitable conclusion. All too quickly. There have been good times but a lot has gone wrong. In fact yesterday nothing went right.

There followed a terrible night of insomnia interrupted by short periods of sleep and awful dreams. All my doubts and fears have been revisited.

Looking back over the last six weeks my fearful being has been battered again and again. The way one bad thing follows another, then another. 

This has left me feeling pretty vulnerable. I'm constantly overthinking and my long learned lessons and techniques to master mental instability do not seem to be working. 

Glimpses of good do appear sometimes. That helps but they are often fleeting. Keeping occupied is usually a good strategy. Indeed I have done some cleaning since I got home on Tuesday. Little triumphs.

What if questions plagued my life for too long. I thought I'd beaten that with Risperidone. Yet today and in recent days it is very evident. 

My many friends are trying to reassure me but feeling depressed always makes me feel worthless. And that doubt, terrible doubt.

I'm hoping today's plan comes off. A trip to Misya this evening with my barrister friend Mark. And tomorrow I get to have a "blather' with my now retired therapist. He's always wise.

I Heard a Voice. 

People of Faith.

I don't recall in my lifetime Easter, Passover and Ramadan all at the same time. The three great monotheistic faiths celebrating together. Oh that peace would follow. 

My admiration for the chaplaincy at the University was based partly on friendship and partly because Allan and his successor Fiona promoted it as being for all faiths and none.

Our team in the new job have people of faith and of none. As I've worked my way through the appraisal process in recent weeks I have celebrated our diversity. 

That Easter hasn't exactly gone to plan is a given, rarely do things run smoothly when I'm with dad. Him suddenly announcing yesterday that he is playing bowls this afternoon blew a away my long laid plan for Easter lunch. Caught between that and a guest having an evening appointment at hospital left me angry and despairing. 

We will get our roast beef but not until this evening; her appointment was postponed. My fear is though that I'm getting as anxious as my mum was.

A couple of weeks on from my mental downturn I still haven't resolved things in my mind. And though off next week my perceived failings at work are making me worry.

Why would I do that? Why does anxiety so cripple me after four years of therapy?

Prevail though I will, just need to take it one day at a time.

To all my Muslim, Jewish and Christian friends I wish you well in this holiest of times. And to all of other faiths or none a message of peace and happiness.

I Heard a Voice. 

Sunshine and Seagulls.

Greetings on this beautiful spring day! The sun has been shining, the air was warm and the seagulls as loud as they ever were.

After a near four month break I have returned to the seaside to visit my dad. The journey wasn't brilliant but here in reasonable time. Glad I didn't drive seeing the state of the lorry park on the M20 as I passed on the train. 

Although not many people are reading at the moment some may be wondering how I am. My last two posts reflect how battered and bruised I was for a while. Things are a little better now although for the life of me I  cannot fathom just what happened in that time.

The age old doubt, fear and anxiety remain lurking below the surface on what otherwise looks like normal life.

Mentally I'm neither depressed nor manic, I just am. Someone once said "no man is an island". However much I run from the world when life is not good I'm still reliant on others. Especially for emotional succour. And when people walk away with little or no explanation it is hard.

I heard something interesting yesterday from a woman I have met a couple of times who openly espouses her diagnosis of BPD decrying why the label has been changed to emotionally unstable personality disorder ask the question "what emotion is stable?" I've not thought of it like that and she is right. 

The myths and lies told about me in 1990s have now been debunked. It only took 30 years. But I am just as vulnerable to the terrible emotion of loss as anyone else is. Who wouldn't struggle as I did in the last few weeks?

Yet I will enjoy the sea, the sun, the people and the cooking over this most important of holidays. To have a longer break is definitely needed.

I Heard a Voice. 

No One Noticed.

The sun is shining but there is a chill in the air on this late Sunday morning. April is here but it feels more like September. 

You find me listening to Handel's opera Acis and Galatea trying to make sense of the last ten days or so.

All those years ago when mental illness grabbed me in an iron fist no one noticed. Maybe I'm good at hiding it. To me it felt like no one cared. Back then it nearly destroyed me completely. It did take away all I believed in but I survived. 

Dealing with people walking away from my life has always troubled me. In truth only someone with no compassion and empathy would feel nothing in those circumstances. 

Yesterday after a second person in ten days walked away no one noticed. I sat in the pub surrounded by my friends but they seemed to barely notice.

I needed them last night but no one came. A day on it has a feeling of the morning after.

Experience tells me it will take 48 hours before people come looking for me. 

So all I can do is enjoy my lunch at The Waggoners, my opera and my reading. The emotion will sort itself out, I just need to give it a little bit of time.