10-10-2002

 I've told this story before, but the pronouns are all wrong, so let's try it again. 

I was not in a good place. Years of untreated depression and undertreated anxiety, a problematic reliance on alcohol to get me through the day, and the latest in a series of highly inappropriate crushes, had led to me lying - not for the first time - on the seating in the maths department, bawling my eyes out.

I was definitely hoping someone would stop and comfort me. It just turned out not to be the person I was hoping it would be.

I'm pretty sure I didn't know who stopped and sat down on the floor next to me, but I knew who it wasn't so I didn't react, and just carried on crying until my tears dried up. I was curled up, face down, hair fallen over my face so I couldn't see them. I hoped they'd go away. I didn't want to talk to anyone new, I didn't want to try and explain. And so even after I stopped crying, I lay there for a while, trying to work up the courage to get up and leave. 

From her point of view, she just a saw a young woman in distress, and knew what that felt like. So she stopped, and waited. She didn't say anything. She just sat there: to see if I needed anything, to just be there. 

We were there sufficiently long that her leg started to cramp, and so she shifted position. I heared the movement, and risked glancing up. And so it was that the first words that my partner of seventeen and a half years said to me - the woman who I raised a child with, bought a house with, got a dog with, the woman who taught me how to cook chili and taught me how to play D&D - the very first words I ever heard her say, were "Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere."

On Depression (Again)

 I'm back on SilverCloud. 

After a few weeks (months?) of debating with myself whether I should reach out to GP again, I instead self-referred for talking therapies and after yet another telephone appointment where I went through my history, current state and reasons for the referral, I panicked at the thought of more targeted help and asked for the one that I've done before and can at least try and approach in my own time. 

I've had limited success (but not no success) with CBT before, so I'm trying my best to approach this as an opportunity to improve on previous effort, become more aware of my cycles of thought-feelings-behaviour, and just find somewhere, anywhere, to interrupt the spirals before I hit the bottom. 

It is, still, frustrating to read the exact same things again, to skim through the theory because I know how this is supposed to work, I know the model that is the basis for the therapy and I know the techniques that I'm going to be asked to use. As I said in my assessment appointment, I know what I need to be doing, I just can't seem to keep it up. And that becomes another stick to beat myself with, another "see? I'm useless". 

I am just about managing to stick with my morning exercises ("but I'm doing the easiest possible level"). The heat waves are interrupting my running schedule ("but I don't always do the full run anyway") and all my attempts at improving my diet keep failing ("I just don't have any willpower"). Finding the time/motivation to meditate or practice mindfulness is always a struggle ("it's like I don't want to get better"). 

I still go into work regularly ("but I don't do anything there") and I still see friends. I've got my regular social engagements, and say yes to as many others as people suggest. I'm planning on going away twice in August - including hopefully to see a football match even though I find both traveling and the idea of being in a crowd of strangers terrifying. I read every day, I do puzzles, I walk the dog, I listen to podcasts and music and watch YouTube videos, sometimes even ones that aren't by the Green brothers ("but none of that is helping"). I joined more Discord servers ("but I'm too shy to join in"). I do at least some housework ("but not enough"). I buy myself things I want and give money to charity ("isn't that supposed to make me happy?"). 

I keep making plans for the future ("but I might not be here") and keep getting out of bed every day ("but what's the point?") and keep trying all the things that are supposed to help because the alternative, not doing all that, feels too much like giving up. And while I am not sure I will ever be "better", I don't want to get "worse". 

I find it so hard to find hope, despite studying the masters, that hope feels forever out of reach for me. But in the absence of hope, there is at least sheer stubbornness, and I think that's what's driving me at the moment. 

Lasts, and firsts

 Yesterday marked five years since I last woke up next to her. Five years since I last kissed her. Five years since I last told her I loved her.

I know these must have happened, because they happened every day, but I don't remember them. I didn't know it would be the last time, so they didn't have enough emotional salience to stick in my memory. I think this must be true for most "last times". Sure, sometimes you know in advance - the last day at a job you are leaving, saying goodbye to a terminally ill relative, a last date before you break up. But mostly we don't. I don't remember the last time I read my son a bedtime story, or the last time I was able to pick him up and carry him. I just assumed there would be another time, and there wasn't.

Firsts are much more memorable, because you know they are firsts. "This has never happened before," your brain goes, "better hang on to this." I remember my first kiss, and my first kiss with Jess. I remember our first meal - bacon with plum sauce and stir-fried veg - and I remember the first tine I heard a Weird Al Yankovic song - it was that evening. (No wonder I fell in love with her.) I remember my son's first recognisable word - "Eyeore" - and his first day at school. 

But, admittedly, sometimes firsts get lost in the mists of time too: I don't recall my own first day at school, or even at university. I don't remember when I first told Jess I loved her, or when she first said that to me. I don't know what our first text messages or emails were. And some lasts also stick in the mind: I remember my last words to Jess, although I don't remember her last words to me. I do at least have her last DM to me: "You are the best. Thank you." 

I don't remember the context. I don't need to. In the absence of other memories, those are good last words.