I feel that I should write something. I’m not entirely sure what I’m going to write, but if I don’t write something soon I’ll get out of the habit of writing and that’d probably spell The End for How do you eat an elephant? Which would be a bit of a shame…..
I suppose I should start by filling you in on the last couple of days which have felt like something approaching good. Yes, you did read that right – I said something approaching good! Okay, so I had a minor melt down at the start of the week but it had been a long time coming I suppose and I’ve just about forgiven myself because I feel like I’ve learned some important lessons along the way. Which is no bad thing…..
Important lesson of the week # 1: If you can’t keep going you have to stop keeping going until you’re ready to get going again.
I’ve also been busy taking care of myself and making a plan. It feels like ages since I’ve a) properly taken care of myself or b) had a plan. It feels so much better to have something to aim for other than Eastenders* I’m not talking about any kind of grand ‘sort your life out in four weeks’ plan, more of a ‘let’s get from a to b and worry about c later’ type plan.
Important lesson of the week # 2: You don’t have to do EVERYTHING right now because there’s plenty of time for everything.
I’ve had a few words with ‘the brain’. It’s a ridiculous state of affairs – we can’t hate one another for ever because we’re pretty much stuck with each other** and whether we like it or not we’re going to have to find a way to rub along together. The deal goes something like this: I will nourish rest and generally take good care of the brain if the brain promises to make a concerted effort to stop with all that over thinking it nonsense. In the fullness of time I’d like the brain to give up on all that up/down/backwards/forwards/shake it all about stuff, but hey! At least we’ve got a start.
Important lesson of the week #3: If you take good care of your brain it will be remarkably compliant when it comes to doing deals.
One week. One meltdown. Three lessons. Could be worse eh?
In conclusion I think things are looking okay. That’s as far as my ‘state of the nation’ update goes: WeeGee is okay. Which is pretty much okay.
Never fear – I’ll be back later with some of the more usual rambling idiocy
Love WeeGee xxx
*Yes. I watch Eastenders. What of it?!
**What with the frontal lobotomy being out of fashion and all….
Where to begin? I suppose I should start with the story of the last few days which can be summarised thusly: ‘the good, the bad, and the downright shitty’. As I write I am somewhere between bad and downright shitty which although not ideal is a whole lot more ideal than just plain downright shitty….
I’m currently signed off from work owing to the downright shittiness that descended on Sunday morning. Being off work is an unusual state of affairs for me and I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it. All I know is that I got to Monday morning (somehow) and it became blindingly obvious to me that I couldn’t carry on going on the way I was going on. My GP and my employer agreed.
Thankfully, it’s a short term ‘rest’ rather than long term sickness. I think a period of long term sickness would drive me mad (ho ho). I’m expected and expecting to be fit to return to work next Tuesday on a ‘phased return’, which would probably be a bit extreme were it not for the extent of the downright shittiness that has been upon me. By the way I’m not going to tell you about the downright shittiness – I’m hoping you will take my word for it: it was DOWNRIGHT SHITTY SHITTINESS for a little while there.
It’s tough enough for anyone to admit that they aren’t coping, but I manage to make it double difficult on myself, because coping is the only thing I do well: whatever the horror in my head, however low I go I make it my priority to function because I don’t want to let people down. I don’t want people to make allowances, or worry about me, or (to be honest) know how bad things have really got for me.
Trouble is that’s pretty much the same as pretending and you can only play make believe with your broken brain for so long….
In the end, for me it came down to a simple choice. Take a break, and go back to work in stages or find myself being a gibbering wreck, probably in hospital and definitely unable to work for a considerable amount of time. As tough as it’s been to say ‘Help!’ and ‘I need to stop’, I feel like I’m doing the right thing and taking care of myself (possibly for the first time in my life)
So I finally said it – in no uncertain terms: things are bad and I can’t cope. Truth told, I already feel like I’m coping better just for having said it. I don’t have to be ‘strong’ all of the time or rather perhaps I’ve misunderstood ‘strength’. I suppose you could call it a lesson well learned.
Don’t worry, we’re not really. Doomed that is, well at least not as far as I know. To be fair, if we were all doomed I’m pretty sure the powers that be would get in touch with someone important (like the Pope) or wise (like the Dalai Lama)* rather than me….. Moving swiftly on before I get myself into trouble.
All kinds of things ‘hold me back in life’. Some of the things that hold me back feel insurmountable at times and I know I have to hold on tight, work hard and keep my head if I’m ever going to deal with them. And that’s fine. I know what my goals are.
At the same time, some of the things that hold me back aren’t so huge and I know that the answer to overcoming them is entirely in my gift. Like for example, the fact that I’m shy.
There you have it. I’m shy and I lack confidence but (and here’s the thing) that’s not because I’m mental. It’s a simple character trait. Sometimes, when you’re mental it’s too easy to forget that you have a ‘personality’ at all – everything gets bound up with your difficulties whether it belongs there or not.
When my mental tendencies get mixed up with my shyness I start to think that I’M DOOMED. Except of course, I’m not doomed. I’m just a bit** mental and a bit shy.
As I said – I’m working on the mental health stuff but there isn’t a magic wand and I just have to keep plugging away. What I tend not to remember is that I have to work on the shyness stuff too – there isn’t a magic wand for that either, but then again I can at least put my mind to it.
So, in light of that, I spent this afternoon deliberately doing things I don’t like doing because I’m shy. That’s deliberately…. as in, on purpose. I stand by my assertion that this is nothing to do with being mental!
Shyness is, in some ways, a little bit like mental health difficulties: everybody experiences it slightly differently even though it has a common name. For me, the biggest part of my shyness is the ‘fear’ that I will ‘look’ foolish. It’s a bit like anxiety, but not quite… sometimes I get anxious and I know how that feels, but most of the time I’m shy and I know how that feels too.
In order to avoid looking foolish I avoid situations where ‘I don’t know what I’m doing’, or where I feel ‘conspicuous’. This means I hardly ever do anything new. It also means that I don’t do some really simple things that I’m perfectly capable of doing, and for that matter, enjoying.
Here’s what I’ve been up to this afternoon
1. Inviting Mr Friendly to dinner even though I was scared he would think it was a stupid idea and that I would end up feeling foolish.
2. Going into a brand new coffee shop, purchasing a beverage and drinking it there even though I had never been in there before and was scared everyone would look at me because I was on my own.
3. Wandering around the boutique type shops in Surbiton even though I had never been in them before, had no money to buy anything and was scared everyone would think I didn’t belong there.
4. Using the coinstar machine in the supermarket even though I thought I might not be able to work it and that everyone would look at me and think I was a fool.
5. Buying an ice lolly on the way home AND EATING IT IN PUBLIC on my own
It seems like a pretty small list of achievements I guess doesn’t it*** but I don’t care, because I decided I was going out of my comfort zone just because I could if I tried. And I did it. And I had a pretty okay day all things considered.
There is a fly buzzing around my flat at the moment. It’s driving me and my cat NUTS*. It’s driving Gryff nuts because a) he can’t catch the little bugger despite his best efforts and b) it’s far too hot for his best fly catching efforts today. It’s driving me nuts because a) it is a fly. Buzzing. In my flat and b) it keeps making me think of that Emily Dickenson Poem ‘I heard a fly buzz when I died’ which in turn is making me think ‘what if I am actually dead but don’t realise it’?
It’s a hotbed of mentalness round here today…..
I thought I was dead once. I stepped out in front of a double decker bus** and it hit me. People say that when they have those kind of near death experiences that ‘their entire life flashes before their eyes’. For my part, the only thing that flashed before my eyes was A DOUBLE DECKER BUS, and the only thought I had was ‘Shit – I’m about to be HIT BY A DOUBLE DECKER BUS’
Anyway, there was this tiny second where I knew I’d been hit by a bus but didn’t know if I was alive or dead. It was the strangest sensation – like not being. It wasn’t a nice sensation but it wasn’t altogether unpleasant either… It didn’t last long because I was soon brought to my senses by a kindly gentleman who reassured me that I was ‘all in one piece’ and pressed a tissue to my head. I had no idea why he was pressing a tissue to my head until he swapped it for another one and I saw the blood. Then the ambulance came and I was all a bit boo hoo for a while. Then I went home all black and blue and ever so slightly confused.
Getting hit by a double decker bus was a pretty painful experience – the headache lasted for days and was like no other headache I’d ever experienced. It also left me with a slightly gammy eye. Still it wasn’t all bad because it gave me two stories to tell.
Story One: the near death experience story.
Story Two: All five feet and two inches of WeeGee, seven stones*** wet through if she’s lucky WAS HIT BY A DOUBLE DECKER BUS AND LIVED TO TELL THE TALE.
Where was I? Oh yeah. There’s a fly buzzing around my flat and it’s driving me MENTAL….. Told you it was a hotbed of mentalness today. It’s going to be a long evening…..
Love from WeeGee and Gryff (demented within an inch of their lives by a buzzing fly) xxx
*No – I can’t swat the fly dead. Committing murder just because something is getting on your nerves is not socially acceptable.
**Accidentally (lest there be any doubt!)
***Ish – I don’t have a clue how much I weigh, wet through or otherwise.
The first song that I wanted to share with you today is so ‘obscure’ that I can’t find it on YouTube and I can’t think of an alternative so I’m a bit stuck as to how to get this post going.
I suppose I could share the other song I wanted to share. It doesn’t relate to the content of my post but it’s been my earworm for the past few weeks and I thought if I posted it on my blog I might be able to banish it from my head:
For the record, I’m not a Kate Bush fan and to be fair it’s probably this version of the song that is stuck in my head:
But no matter….. back to the point.
I had my counselling session today. I don’t tend to write about my counselling sessions because they’re private, but today’s was a bit different because I feel like I had a revelation so I wanted to share it. Be warned though, this is all a bit cryptic so I hope it makes at least some sense….
Mrs Mountain (that’s the counsellor) and I were talking about ‘waiting’ today. Sometimes, I feel like I’m waiting for the future to start which is what got us on to the subject, but it soon became clear that it isn’t just the future that I’m waiting for. I’m waiting for something very specific to happen, and even though I know in my heart that this specific thing is never going to happen, I’m still waiting for it to happen. I don’t know if that’s blind faith, or hope, or stupidity but it’s just the way it goes in my head. I’m happy to wait even if I’m waiting for nothing. Or at least I thought I was.
The thing is Mrs Mountain is good at examples that challenge the way I’m thinking and today’s example was a particularly good one:
If you turn up at a bus stop just after the bus you need has left and you stand there you are waiting – even though the bus isn’t going to show up because you missed it, you’re still waiting. If, on the other hand, you arrive at the bus stop just in time to see your bus pulling away and you choose to stand there anyway you aren’t waiting for the bus anymore. You’re doing something different.
“Fine” I said. “If I stand at the bus stop long enough another bus will come along”
And that was exactly her point. I’m not actually waiting for the thing I think I’m waiting for. I’m just telling myself that for now because I’m not ready to catch a different bus just yet – but deep inside I know I’m going to be strong enough to catch a different bus sooner or later. That, I think, is a small crypitc step in the right direction!
Love from WeeGee (waiting for a different bus after all)
Sooner or later I will drown In your memory. You will forget the hooked Nose of my profile, The giddy sleepless chatter Of our first year, Even my laughter which Fooled no-one.
I will fade behind all that your Eyes are yet to fix on. Become a different continent As far away as home. And if I come to the surface I will be the kind of sad summer That your memory must Trade with time.
I woke up at a funny time this morning – too late to go back to sleep and too early to get up. I decided that if I couldn’t sleep and I didn’t want to get up I might as well stay in bed and have myself a nice little rest.
Of course, it wasn’t long before my nice little rest turned into a bit of a think. I was thinking about wills: specifically whether I should revisit mine, and whether, if I did, I would be considered to have been of sound mind at the time of writing.
This got me thinking about my granny. She died when I was fifteen leaving behind only a few words dictated to my dad quite literally on her death bed. After her death these few words caused more arguments, and ill feeling and general nastiness than you can ever imagine*. It was my first insight into what a death can bring out in people. It wasn’t pretty.
The thing is, my granny died after a very long illness and for the last few months of her life, her diagnosis was terminal. I’ll never forget the conversation that I had with my dad as he tried to explain that there was nothing more that could be done – it felt like someone had taken my heart in their hands and wrung all the good things out of it.
We knew she was dying and she knew she was dying and it has bothered me for a long time that, under those circumstances, she didn’t have a will. She was an organised careful person and I just couldn’t understand why she hadn’t been organised and careful in that regard.
As I was thinking this morning it occurred to me that perhaps, even in the face of what she was told was certain death, she believed she was going to live. Maybe it was hope, or determination, or the survival instinct that kept her from writing a will. And that notion felt like it meant something to me.
Does that make sense?
I don’t want to be alive, but that really isn’t the same thing as wanting to die** and I often think about the survival instinct. My thinking goes something like this: If I found myself in a lift*** that was plummeting to the ground from twenty stories up, I imagine that for the whole of the descent I’d be thinking that something would happen that would make it okay. I don’t suppose it would occur to me that I was actually going to die until the very moment of impact (at which point it wouldn’t matter, because I’d be dead). Human beings are going to die, but we also seem to be programmed to believe that we’re not going to die at any given moment. Again, that seems to mean something to me.
Why do I mention any of this? I’m not entirely sure, other than what it seems to say to me is something about hope. Hope is important.
Love from a hopeful WeeGee xx
PS – I read somewhere that if you find yourself in a plummeting lift your best bet is to lie on top of someone larger than yourself. It seems a bit mean, but I do find myself taking note of the physical stature of my companions when I get into lifts. Just in case, you know.
*Shortly before she became ill my granny had remarried, so we ended up with two feuding families. I hated it.
**You will either understand that or you won’t. I can’t put it any better than that
I’m in a bleak and vulnerable place. I don’t want that to rub off on anybody so skip over this one if you see fit….
I haven’t managed to blog for a couple of days because I haven’t had the mental capacity for it and, if I’m perfectly honest, I’m not altogether sure that I have the mental capacity for it now. Still, on account of the fact that no-one has invented a clever device that transfers my thoughts into a nice neat blog post yet I’m going to have to give it a go for myself.
Where to start? Hmm…. well, I suppose I could start with a confession.
I’m not being entirely honest with people about the place I’m in. I know that breaks so many of the ‘rules’, but I don’t really know what else to do apart from stick a smile on my face and say “I’m fine”. The alternative is saying “I’m hollow, and empty and I wish I wasn’t alive and there is nothing that can happen, or that you can say that will ever change any of that” Nobody wants to hear that, do they?
I know what people would say to me. They’d say that was ‘broken brain’ speaking’ and that you HAVE to ask for help. Here’s the thing – my brain doesn’t work properly – everyone knows that but IT DOESN’T MAKE ME AN IDIOT. So I ask for ‘help’. What is it that is going to help? More pills? A stay in hospital where I can feel exactly the way that I do now only in sterile surroundings? Talking about things that there is no answer to? It doesn’t help. I’ve been around the block enough times to know that. I don’t mean to be unkind or ungrateful to the people in my life who want to help, I really don’t. I just want them to understand that there is no help.
The people I know in real life are good and kind people and they are forever saying ‘just let me know if there’s anything I can do to help’. But I can’t tell them what they could do help, because it’s not the way the world works. What would really help right now is somebody gathering me up, staying by my side and showing me how it is that you go about doing this thing called living. Nobody wants to do that – it’s too much to ask.
So instead, I’ll do what I always do. I’ll smile. I’ll say ‘I’m fine’, ‘work’s great’, ‘Yeah I’m really busy’ and I’ll continue to curl up into a ball whilst staring into the mid distance and listening to all that living going on around about me.
Love from WeeGee (misery guts)
See this post here? The one you’re reading at this very moment? Well it’s a special post because it’s post number ONE HUNDRED on How do you eat an elephant. What a momentous occasion……
To understand quite how momentous an occasion this is you have to know something about me: I’m rubbish at seeing things through. For a start the slightest little thing can defeat me and if I get defeated I give up completely. I also have a habit of just losing interest. Something can be the best thing ever one day and then completely forgotten the next. Finally, I’m just a bit rubbish when it comes to finishing things – I’ve got no staying power! Here’s an example. I’ve been knitting a cardigan (the same cardigan) since Christmas 2009. I’ve got a back and a side and a half so far. I expect to finish it in time for winter 2015. I hope it’s a cold one because it’s a super cosy cardigan.
But I digress. You don’t want to hear about my cosy cardigan.
I bet you’re wondering what I’m going to do with post ONE HUNDRED aren’t you?*
I’ll tell you what I’m going to do.
I’m going to accept this lovely award:
And then tell you about seven things that WeeGee loves.
The rules of the Seven things about me are thus:
Thank the blogger who nominated you.
Share seven things about yourself.
Nominate other bloggers you think deserve the award, and post on their blog to let them know they’ve been nominated.
Angel Fractured at the Mirth of Despair nominated me for this one a while back. Thank you Angel Fractured for a) the lovely nomination, b) the lovely comments you leave on my blog and c) your own lovely blog and other lovely blog.
Here are seven things that WeeGee loves
1. I love my cat
Gryff is the best cat in the world. That, by the way, is a simple matter of fact.
He’s an odd little fellow but that just makes me love him all the more. He’s frightened of so many weird and wonderful things that never a day goes by that I don’t find something else he’s afraid of. Today for example I discovered he’s afraid on me emptying the coins out of my purse.
Although he’s nervous he’s also a happy little soul – full of chit chat, and purrs and those funny little gremlin noises cats make when they’re interested in something. He’s a brave boy when it comes to hunting insects down and he has a special talent for getting himself stuck on top of the wardrobe moments before I need to leave the flat.
Gryff has been in my life for six years – which is to say he’s been there through thick and through thin. I honestly don’t know how I would have coped with the last year and a half if it hadn’t been for Gryff.
Here is Gryff looking grumpy because he has been disturbed from his slumber for an impromptu photo opportunity:
Here he is again wondering when the impromptu photo opportunity is going to end and thinking I’m an idiot:
Finally, here he is in a variation of croissant cat position**:
Dear Gryff. I love you. From WeeGee xx
2. I love Monk
I don’t just love Monk – I’m obsessed with Monk – which is quite apt really. I’ve watched every single episode AT LEAST three times. That’s how obsessed I am.
I love Monk because I love the central character, Adrian Monk. I love that he is so sad and broken but also so kind and funny at the same time. I love the way that he almost gets to where he needs to be but then his brain gets in the way and he ends up back at square one.
Maybe Adrian Monk reminds me of myself? Maybe Monk just makes me laugh? Maybe I just love Monk for its own sake. Whichever it is – I love Monk.
3. I love my blogging buddies
Before WordPress came to WeeGee land, I was dubious about online friendships.
I’m not anymore.
I’ve ‘met’ a lot of people here in the World of Blog and (as we’ve already established) I’ve come to care about them all a great deal. Here’s the other thing though…. meeting people, and getting to know them, and forming relationships with them – even if it is online – has really helped me to prove something to myself.
My life is better for the people I’ve met on WordPress. I love all the courage and humour and strength that I find in the blogs I read. It almost makes me think that I don’t want to be normal because normal people have none of the awesomeness and wonderfulness that the mentals do.
At this point I want to give a special ‘shout out’ to my brain twin and fellow alien – Carrie at Hello Sailor. Who’d ever have thunk that there would be two of us eh? I reckon we could be a force to be reckoned with xx
4. I love balsamic vinegar
I don’t know when I ‘discovered’ balsamic vinegar, or what my taste buds did before that momentous day. All I can say is…. what is life without balsamic vinegar? It’s an amazing foodstuff. I love it. Love it, love it, love it. Yum yum (for my tum)
Here, by the way, is the best balsamic that money can buy***:
5. I love the Olympics
Where do I start?!
I had no idea that I was going to love the Olympics being in London until the Olympics were in London and I can’t imagine a day coming along that is better than my day out at the Olympics, I really can’t. Ever. As long as I live. It was way too amazing for words…..
Fortuitously, I’ve been on annual leave for Olympic fortnight and I was going to write a post about all the fun I’ve had watching all kinds of weird, bizarre and wonderful sports – like rowing, and cycling, and pole vaulting, and the modern pentathalon, and HORSES. DANCING. TO MUSIC. But instead I’ve got two words for you:
Mo Farrah.
That is all.
6. I love Frank Turner
Okay, so I know I go on about this all the time, but I love Frank Turner. I truly do. Frank Turner’s music makes me feel like I belong even though I live in a world that I don’t belong in.
Frank Turner’s music has brought me through some pretty awful and dark days – it’s been like a faithful companion to me and has provided something solid to hold on to when everything else was turning into nothing.
I love Frank Turner. I love his music.
Here is Frank Turner doing some music:
7. I love this guy
This is Morgan Parra (the little French kicker) he’s quite handsome, no?
There you go then. Now you know seven things that I love and you have experienced my 100th post.
As for nominations – I thought I’d pass this one on to:
How do you eat an elephant? 