Over on Metal Health Week post... @NikNik shared Denialle's story and asked "
What would you say to your unwell self?
I started to answer in a spirit of engagement and this, just, flowed out of me. I am present enough to know that would not have been an okay answer over on that thread... and if you are already feeling down yourself skip reading it, it's a downer.
________________________
My unwell self is the one who is mostly here, all the time now. The layers of years and years of the reality of living with a mental illness have taken their toll. I awake in the morning and my mind immediately goes to - I don't want to be here - but I tell myself, you are loved and your beloved needs you, the dogs need you, your Mother needs you.
Then I swing my numb and painful legs off the edge of the bed and stagger the first 20 steps of the day until the nerves come on line and I swallow the pills that shut down the wailing inside. I spend the first two coffees jerking my mind like a fish on a line trying to reel in the out of control thinking and plan my day.
A day filled with long lonely hours and losing myself in social media. I do the dishes, i wash the clothes, i make the beds, i vacuum. I might occasionally have a project to make a series of posters or some other graphic design job for a little NGO I support quid pro quo. And the unraveled mess of me gets showered and dressed and I blow dry my hair and put on a colourful outfit and leave the house for 20 minutes to walk the dogs, talk to strangers and shop for dinner. Then home and back into my snuggly uglies and maybe watch some TV or read for the next few hours,
I was once a high functioning full of energy manic-depressive, falling over every few months, but always getting up again, up again, up again. Even in my long years of undiagnosed madness, I always found the place and energy to work and be brilliant and shine for a little while. Now... now I am a barely hanging in there, day by grueling day.
I smile and try to be happy when beloved comes home, she doesn’t need a puddle of grief and mess when she is out there supporting us both.
So I tell my unwell self - all of these moments are shit, but you are not. Get up and do something for someone else.
_______________
That is pretty sad huh? I am sitting here with tears in my eyes thinking "poor moongal". I would so love to turn it all round, but don't know how anymore. Is this fair grief, is it okay to be this honest and say it? Could I change it? Can I change it? Is this just a depression? Is it a valid response to a shrunken disabled life. I am lost and lonely and wish I could die, but also know that I will not do that. Because I love her, my beloved she would never recover. I have a responsibility in love to stay. 24 years of shared love, no matter how bad I feel I must not chuck that away.
I know this is not a crisis service and actually this is not a crisis, it is just how it is day in day out.
I try to think what I can do to shift this blanketing malaise, I want to start swimming again, but every time I have in the past year, my new thing - the painful bursitis in both shoulders - flares up.
Anyways - I think this was very helpful just to get it out, I shove it down and pretend its all okay for a while, then this... this that I have written bubbles to the surface again. At least writing this I got to cry for a while. I better take my meds. I hope this long haul of waiting for the TPD claim is over soon it hasn;t been good for me.
Tears are to the soul what soap is to the body.
[Jewish Proverb]
