29th November 1988

The beginning of this week started off badly but the reality of it struck today when S said I was looking very well again, and asked if I felt well, I shrugged my shoulders and turned away knowing that the night before I felt like killing myself, so ironic, how can anybody understand what you're going through, he then went mad and said how rude it was of me to do that, I gave a nervous smile, said sorry and walked off. You want so many people to listen to how you're feeling and acknowledge that, I am physically well again in appearane, because my system has recovered from being mucked up, which I was told would take 6 months to fully do that, so obviously I look better, but the more I look well, the harder it is for me to say anything, thinking that people won't believe you or just say you're being pessimistic and negative, but that's not true, it's the reality of how I'm feeling, it's being honest with yourself. Who would have guessed that I've been up till 3am crying and fighting against these strong feelings, yes, I know its true that they don't come as often as they used to, but when they do they are just as strong, for instance I felt really bad and Wednesday and Thursday and good on Friday and Sunday, during these good times you wonder whether you're being silly and that those feelings were not really that bad, you start believe that there is nothing wrong with you, but when those feelings come back, they are bad. You wonder whether those feelings have gone for good and you try and convince yourself that you don't really feel like that, but unfortunately when they come back again, that's not the case, they are dangerous, frightening and extremely low feelings and you don't know what is going to help. You have no answers, they could eventually lead to self-harm. I have made my promise, which I shall keep for as long as possible, although it's extremely difficult but the reason why I can be so sure is because so many people have tried to help me so much, I can't leave them feeling useless and in despair. I live only for them but not for myself, it is sad, but honestly that is the truth. I can't go through life putting up with these feelings which I know now, after trying to put them to the back of my mind, are going to follow me like a cloud for the rest of my life. Everybody says I should phone when I feel like that, I've phoned M about 3 times, I can't anymore, because it's too much of a burden. Imagine if I phoned on Monday night and said I felt like killing myself, the whole world is hopeless, what's the point in making her feel helpless and so desperate that she has to phone dad. It's my responsibility, I can't lay it on other people who have tried there damn hardest to keep me going. They're just going to get sick of me phoning every week feeling the same. I felt that the 3rd time I phoned M she must have thought, my god, not again. People give up on others who can't help themselves. That's what it boils down to, the end result has to come from me. If I can't help myself nobody can. The only way I help myself at the moment is by turning up at work everyday, I'd be dead if I wasn't going to work, and I've made my promise so I have to go to work, the next day is always unbearable. There is not others ways I can help myself, mentally I am not well, but I have to face up to it, that's what's so hard. I can't help myself, half the time my thoughts aren't together, they're all in pieces. I don't want to go out, I don't want to meet other people, I don't want to see my friends. So if I can't help myself, how can I possibly expect to get help from others, they've tried so damn hard, how can I possibly moan and feel low, knowing that I'm getting a car in 4 weeks, that's the impression I get from everybody, I'm in exactly the same position as I was with the flat, leaving school, moving into a lovely new flat, everything's going to be brilliant. I've learnt that that's not true, material things, however much they mean to you, never change the way you feel. I suppose a lot of people would think that was rubbish, but it's not if you've experienced it. Yes, I'm getting a car and I appreciate that, I suppose that adds even more pressure for me to say nothing and that is really hard to put up with. The car will be brilliant, it will change the way I feel for a very short time, like that flat did, because I've got something new to focus on and think about and when the novelty wears off, that's is. It's a hard and realistic lesson to learn, maybe it has worked out for other people. It could be a scorching hot day, you could be in a lovely park with flowers and a beautiful view, but you can feel utterly miserable. The same will happen on Thursday, I'll walk into work and put on the funny face act, and nobody will know any different. Who would have thought that I think like this?

30th Nov - See Key Nurse
6th Dec - Work some overtime
7th Dec - See Key Nurse
8th Dec - See GP

7th December

I'm working late because I don't feel better, I suppose in a way that's a good sign because I'm wanting to keep myself busy, but then it isn't because what am I going to do after Christmas. I don't' want to do anything else. I'm anxious about my cousin going away because I suppose in a way I have wanted to change and in way I don't. I will think a lot about just not bothering to get on with life, is it really worth it? all the hassles, everything you have to go through, and the other half of me thinking, "come on, get yourself going, hang on, work on things that you have to change in order to make yourself feel better, it's going to take a long time, but it's worth it in the end, is it?", what if it takes forever. I just don't want to risk anything for other peoples sake, but then do I really want to be in other people's company when my cousin is away, I don't, but I know what might happen if I don't. Half of me has changed and the other half hasn't, and that what I'm trying to fight off, it's like winning a losing battle.

12th December

I couldn't go back to work today because I was so mentally exhausted. The problem is that physically I can handle it now, which I never could do, but mentally I am still behind, they are not the same level. I woke up this morning not knowing what day it was, the whole morning I was behind. I had done so much at the weekend and my mind can't keep up. It's all very well keeping yourself busy and organising things to do, but its not the way I want to go about improving things for myself. I need to relax a lot more, my whole back and neck is in knots.

13th Dec - Dad Visiting

13th December

I feel so low, as low as I was when I was in the hospital. I don't even feel I can go back to work on Thursday. I just feel that there is nothing for me at all, but of course I'll go to work, because pleasing other people gets the better of me.

14th Dec - Go and see cars - Bought a Red VW Polo, E Reg, can collect soon.
16th Dec - See Key Nurse
17th Dec - Borrowed Gran's car
18th Dec - Accident at Waverly Bridge
21st Dec - See Key Nurse. Y.P.U Party
25th Dec - Collected my car
29th Dec - See GP
4th Jan 1989 - See Key Nurse

6th January 1989

This whole week has been awful, I've just been thinking about different ways of killing myself, with no pain and nobody feeling responsible. I think what I was talking to my key nurse about on Wednesday sticks in my mind. What hurts so much is that people can't understand something that is not visible, they can understand someone being off with a broken leg or even a cold, but if it's something like depression then that's different, and in fact depression is far more mentally exhausting and destructful than minor injuries, I wouldn't be off I had a cold. Maybe I should have gone to work but it only delays the whole process until later on. Just by missing work people think you're not making an effort at all, when in fact all the time you are struggling and fighting against it so that it doesn't take over your whole life. When I'm really fed up I don't talk to anyone. I had never discussed things before I was in hospital. You get to the stage where you're talking to people and you know they don't understand how you feel. They're nodding their head in agreement but they don't understand. I think a person needs courage more than anything else. You need courage to live, and if you're going to live then you've got to work hard. When you've courage you can get over your difficulties. You've got to work hard to get anything out of life. The harder you work at it, the better you might do. When I'm too frightened to go out to work, I feel a coward and I try and think it won't happen again. I try to hide away from the facts. It's just the feeling that I might wake up one morning feeling there's just no point in getting up, actually having the nerve not to go to work. I'm dropping all the time; I can't understand why anyone my age should get depressed. I'm getting away from something; I can't see any goals to go for at the moment. I keep running but I don't get any nearer. I can't see any change, not at all. I can force myself to keep under control. If I know I was going to be depressed for a long time, I would put and end to it. Commit suicide or something, but how do you know? I keep waiting for the day when I can get up and feel happy. You're no good to yourself and you're no good to anyone else if you're depressed, when you're no good to anyone else, other people get that impression before you actually get it yourself. It's bad enough being depressed but when you're depressed you're in danger. It's dangerous so you've got to stop being depressed. It's dangerous because if you do anything to yourself you don't feel it because there is so much anxiety and energy built up inside. The worst that could happen I suppose would be cutting myself so much that I bled to death, or taking an overdose. I suppose the worst thing is that I would crack up. Get really mental. I might end up as a cabbage, and being a cabbage I might still be able to realise that if I had relieved that anxiety all this madness need not have happened.

7th January

It's not death I'm frightened of, but really going mad, or getting to a stage where I was beyond repair without being mad. I would be the same person as I am now but I would never be able to do anything right. I would look normal, but I could never lead a normal life. I would never be able to decide things for myself. I wouldn't realise what I was doing. I don't feel like this all of the time. I just get moods, when I get this mood, that's when the build up starts. I can be completely normal one minute and then the next I don't know what I'm doing. Because I have this capacity to overdose, I also have a capacity for going mad. When I get to the stage where I'm scared to cut myself or take an overdose, I shall know I'm on my way to getting better. I wouldn't say I was really bothered about dying, I think about it often enough. Suicide is the only way you can bring death under control. If I took a load of tablets I would just go to sleep and that would be it, and you never know, I might have a terrible thing is store for me. I might have an accident at work, I could die of cancer. Suicide may be the easy way out. If I don't feel well I think about it much more. You get oversensitive about it and feel paranoid about being on your own as well.

8th January

The sort of picture I would draw for these low feelings would be black clouds, there would be a storm brewing, black clouds with flashes of lightening. I would place myself at the top where the lightening is. I am at the brink of it, then it's about to roll over me and when it rolls over me that's it, another overdose? Or another harmful action, but I'm on the edge of it, I feel it would miss me in a way. I think it's going to go round me instead of through me, when I get really down it goes through me. A storm is something we can't control. This mood, this feeling that comes over me, I sort of feel I can't control it. It takes over me. If I'm feeling down I just want it to go through me, like it has done before. If I'm feeling OK then I want it to blow over. The storm doesn't frighten me; if it did then I wouldn't do the things I've done. It's helpful; if the storm were a person it would be of greater strength than me. It would be something more powerful, something that could dominate. It would put me in a position where I had to do as it commanded. It's a figure that stands over you and looks down on you as if he's saying that he's going to conquer you. You give in. There is no resistance to it. You accept it, you accept what it's going to do and therefore you go along with it. If he went away I would feel a bit lost and lonely.

10th January

My mind was like a torture chamber this morning, racing, searching, wondering, but no sense, just more confusion, more tormenting thoughts. I sometimes wonder whether I can carry on or not feeling this way. It's not that I want to die but neither can I keep going on feeling the way I do. I'm finding it hard to put up with, and I don't know what else I can do to help myself. It's hard to stop thoughts or ignore them. There is a difference in being depressed and being unhappy, even if you have suffered the most grievous blow, you are able to seek comfort and let that comfort come through to you to ease the pain. You can seek out and obtain another's sympathy and loving concern, you can be kind and comfort yourself, but in depression neither the sympathy or concern of other one the gentle love of oneself is available. Other people may be there offering all the love, sympathy and concern any person could want, but none of this compassion can pierce the wall that separates you from them, while inside the wall you not only refuse yourself the smallest ease and comfort but you also punish yourself by words and deeds. Depression is a prison where you are both suffering prisoner and the cruel jailor.

11th Jan - See Key Nurse

12th January

The prison of depression is pitifully lonely; it is an isolation, which changes even your perception of you environment. Intellectually you know that you are sharing a space with other people, that you are talking to them and that they are hearing you, but their words come to you as if across a bottomless chasm and even though you can reach out and touch another person, or that person touches you, nothing is transmitted to you in that touch. No human contact crosses the barrier. Even objects around you seem further away, although you know it is not so, and while you are aware that the sun is shining and the birds are singing, you know even more poignantly, that the colour's drained from the sky and the birds are silent. How can you describe this experience and convey its meaning to someone else saying that you are depressed, or really down, or fed up, can mean to another person no more than Monday morning blues, or something you could snap out of if you really tried, but you know that it is one a passing mood or something that will vanish if you try to pull yourself together. The turmoil of your feeling is so great that it is impossible to know where to begin to describe them, so it is better to remain silent. Inside the prison of depression you are very selfish, but then aren't we all selfish when we are fighting for our lives? feeling the terror of imminent death we strive to save ourselves. The outside observer the depressed person does no seem to be in danger of dying, but inside the prison of depression, you feel a fear as great as that of death. The fear is so great that death might be welcome as peace, you become and expert in guilt, every action or every omission of an action you can interrupt as a cause for fault. You long for death to bring you peace. Death may bring peace, but it will take away the hope that one-day the terrible grief you bear will be recompensed, that your heart will be lightened. You tell no one of this grief, since a sensible person would say; you should be over that by now. Hopelessness brings on thought that things will never change, or if they do they will only get worse. You are filled with grey heavy indifference, even toward people who were once important to you. Love had fled, leaving only an awareness of an absence of love. Once you were concerned about other people's tragedies, but now they do not impinge on you, or only serve as further proof, if further proof were needed, that the world is in a perilous state. You pretend that everything is all right, you try and smile and be ordinary, but the pretence is so wearying and inside you are silently screaming.

16th Jan - My Birthday (18th) - went out for a meal. Car Accident
18th Jan - See Key Nurse
19th Jan - See GP
23rd Jan - See Key Nurse
1st Feb - See Key Nurse
8th Feb - Dad visiting. See Key Nurse + Psychiatrist

9th February

So much has been going on lately, the confusion in my mind is building up. The more I hear other people opinions, disapprovals or approvals, the more I steer away from the decisions I make. The funny thing about the car crash on my birthday is that on that morning I was feeling better than I had felt for a long time, and if it had not happened I think I would be much further forward that I am now. I feel I am back at the beginning, and I still haven't been abe to say that all the time I am looking, searching and thinking of a way to kill myself. In the past week when I have been trying to get to sleep, I am aware that my tablets are on the table next to me and I can't stop thinking about them, I suppose it's because it's so much easier thinking about that than moving on but it is still very disturbing knowing that it is still on my mind. I am off on holiday tomorrow morning and I am not going to think about my job, the unit or anything else to do with my present situation here.

9th Feb - See GP
10th Feb - Fly down to see friend
15th Feb - Stay at Dad's
16th Feb - Fly back to Edinburgh

10th - 15th February

It was a feeling of intensity I had never experienced before, intense anxiety, distant and detached, in a world away from reality. I don't know how I survived those 5 days. I would have cracked up had it been 2 weeks. Now being back at the flat, I feel quite relieved and not wanting to get in contact with anybody. As I came back from work today I realised that I always feel I must be alone, however bad I feel I don't want to be with anyone. I usually always feel like that after work. I can cope with the people at work, just being work friends, but that is as far as it goes. All through the holiday I was on edge, and my friend's friend came, I always thought they were talking about me. I keep thinking that she hated me, and I couldn't get these thoughts out of my head. I've experienced these feeling before but somehow it was so intense because the last time I spent any length of time with her was when I was back at school which was one and a half years ago, so I could easily tell the difference and I was so conscious of it. Whereas other times I'm not so conscious of it. I'm always wondering what everyone thinks of me; I hate thinking like that, but maybe its just lack of self-confidence. When I go on buses I always put on my Walkman because it lessens the sense that you think people are watching you and following you. I hate being in the company of anybody; I'm always on edge. I've felt a lot of detachment from reality recently although its been half and half, as though I'm not fully conscious yet part of me is and I can't think straight. I feel as thought I'm going mad. I feel like I'm dreaming when I'm awake. I can't stand staying at people's houses anymore, its such a change because I've always loved it, but now something has changed the way I think.

18th Feb - Back to work

20th February

I suddenly thought today, when I was in the flat by myself that I'm leading a low existence by not seeing many people, keeping myself to myself. I am able to be less depressed; as soon as I'm in contact with people I immediately start feeling low and not able to manage.

22nd Feb - See Key Nurse
1st March - See Key Nurse
2nd March - See GP
4th March - Leave work to start Employment Training at Atlantic Text

4th March

The anxiety that I have felt today has been unbearable.

6th March - Start Atlantic Text

8th March

I haven't written this for sometime. I think mainly because I've been quite confused lately about what I've been actually thinking. I just seem to have these mental blocks. I lose track of time and days, I forget things continuously. I have left the butchers shop I was working in, thank god, and have started this course, which is good. I am only in my third day, but I enjoy the work. It can get confusing, I get very tired because I'm not used to being up so early. Like the butchers I don't have a commitment with people, they are just people you work with and that is fine by me. My interest in people and other aspects of life is getting worse. To me, people I see in the street, people I know, the world in general is just cardboard cutouts. The less contact I have with friends the better I feel, the more contact and involvement, the worse I feel.

9th March - See Key Nurse

9th March

I am no longer able to determine where my own internal world of thought, drive and emotions end and where the external world begins. No, I'm not happy with the way I feel (the fact about not wanting to be with people or see people), but I feel better not being in touch than being in touch, I always feel I must be alone. I think I need to start eliminating the fact that I'm bothered about what other people think, because that comes up in everything and is more dominant. I need to think about other thoughts, which could be just as dominant. I'm not totally honest with anybody, which makes it harder for other people to gain insight. I don't feel I exist anywhere, I don't feel part of our family, part of anything really. I realise that if I was happy with my situation and the way I felt I wouldn't have any thoughts about killing myself, because I would be content. When I don't want to do anything, there is still this feeling of boredom around, agitation, tense, restlessness. I suppose the reason why I don't want to do a normal course is because I don't want to make new friends and if you don't have any friends, then people talk about you, and I couldn't put up with that. On this course I feel able to be myself, act how I feel, because I know people don't bother and they just do their own thing. I have felt the lack of interest in other people, not being able to form relationships, lack of initiative for some time, but being bothered about what other people think has always dominated that. As those feelings become stronger they become more dominating, enabling me to let those feelings be shown. On the course I find it hard to keep my concentration going for any length of time, I get tired and desperately want to pack my Saturday job.

16th March - See Key Nurse

16th March

Everybody's saying how much better I am, but the thing is, yes, I'm doing more to help myself and I suppose things have changed, but the way I actually feel hasn't changed at all, I'm trying to put up with it as much as possible, but these feelings continue to pull me down, people may say “but you're enjoying the course, you manage to be there every day”, that's true, and yet I'm still unhappy. I hate feeling the way I do, I constantly go through in my mind deferent ways I could kill myself, when the best time would be, how I could make it so that no one feels responsible. I keep saying to myself that I can stop thinking this way but it continues to haunt my mind, and there has to be a reason for this, it's not that I want to kill myself, but I want to get away from these intense feelings, and this seems the only way, I can't carry on living feeling the way I do. The advantages and disadvantages of writing down opinions and classing them, the “advantages and disadvantages of ................” Most of what I write down is general feelings and thoughts that have been on my mind during one day or some days. My opinions usually arise when I am making a big decision, e.g. leaving school, moving to Scotland, sharing a flat with my cousin, whether to get a job or carry on studying. Apart from that my opinions are very limited. When people ask me for opinion I can never think of anything or give them an emotional response. If an opinion exists then it's usually because I'm bothered about what other people say.

17th March - Dad Visiting
23rd March - See GP

26th March

Slowly it's becoming too painful to write my thoughts and feelings down, but I know I must because I have to remember how I've been feeling, I have to try and communicate some of the time to people who are trying to help me, although most of the time I just can't. The past few day that I've had off, reminded me of when I left school and I was staying in the flat, it's painful to think back to that time but both situations have things in common. I stayed in bed most of the time, I didn't let anybody know that I hadn't gone to London, so there were no phone calls, it was magic, peace, but somehow frustrating, ruthlessness set in, so I tried to sleep it off because even though I was restless I didn't want to do anything else. I longed to be back at college just so I could get people off my back, not that they have been that much bother, but at least they would know I was doing something.

28th March - See Key Nurse

26th March

I don't think the way I feel is just simply being depressed. I don't want peoples company and I don't want to do anything. It disturbs me because of the reasons why I don't want to do these things. I don't want to be in peoples company because it makes me feel very uncomfortable and I get restless, I'm not interested in their conversations. I suppose I have no interest in them, I don't know what I'm wanting. It's the lack of drive as though some kind of weight is pulling me down. What's the point in existing when you're not doing anything in your life? Tomorrow, always tomorrow, a part of me keeps saying tomorrow you'll be your old self again, tomorrow you'll find a reason to be alive, and you'll be ready to start living again.

29th March

Here I am lying in bed feeling that my existence is pretty miserable. Most of my days are spent going to college, which is difficult, but I have to try and get there, I've got to keep going. I finish at 3pm and I go straight home and usually sleep until 5:30pm, watch television and then I can never be bothered to cook anything so I usually have toast and more toast. Sometimes I manage spaghetti on toast or something similar, and then I lie on my bed for the rest of the evening. On Sundays I usually stay in my bed all day.

TO BE CONTINUED...............................................................................