Wednesday
Wednesday’s child was, indeed, full of woe. Woke up to the surreal sight of Liv cleaning my hob. My flat, incidentally, was to be cleaned to within in an inch of its life this week by friends who were either trying to keep busy or just didn’t know what to say – in some instances, both.
Anna the Greek – whom some of you will remember best for her Tina Turner wig – was next on shift. Luckily, she is a better mental health chaperone than she is a wingwoman. She arrived bright and early and started taking the first of a handful of calls that she had before she could give her undivided attention to ALL MY PAIN.
My phone rang, it was Alana from the Maudsley . She said no-one could come to my flat that day, but if I could make my way down, they could see me at 11am. A flurry of activity ensued, the Greek and I got in an Uber and we were there by 10:48. Bit keen, how shaming. Reception called Alana, who let us know she and a doctor were on the way, but it was a bit of a walk. So, The Greek and I prepared ourselves for a bit of a wait. The Maudsley is not beautiful and whilst it may have had some semblance of a waiting room pre-COVID, today there was nowhere to sit but the stairs.
We sat, and we talked. I got sad about The Guy again. Getting Sad About The Guy has, infuriatingly, become my perpetual to-do list. A brief selection of the sub-tasks on that list are: ‘Reminiscence’, ‘Feeling Like An Idiot’, ‘Being Despairing Of Ever Finding Another Man I’m Even Remotely Attracted To’, ‘Trying To Get Angry With Him’, ‘Regret’, ‘Self-Flagellation’ and not forgetting one of my favourites and most time-consuming: ‘Missing Him With Every Breath In My Body’. Quite the party in my head, I’m sure you’ll agree.
I start talking to Anna about him and I literally cry on her shoulder. Crying on the stairs of a London’s largest psychiatric hospital whilst the inpatients and outpatients ebbed and flowed around us. How the fuck had things come to this? Suddenly though, an elderly chap, travelling determinedly against the tide, was in reception. He was in full camouflage gear: helmet, vest (complete with torch and various other accoutrements) , boots, the lot. Under the vest and over his cammo pants, he was wearing full-body white waterproofs. There was a light drizzle outside.
His entry caused not even the merest of ripples in the reception area. He’d obviously been here many times before. Part of me was thrilled: my first PROPER MENTALIST. There was a minor altercation with the one of the receptionists as they reminded him he had to put a mask on.
“It’s too difficult to fit on with my helmet” he said. Removal of the helmet was evidently not an option here. He sat on the sole chair in reception, a few feet away from Anna and I.
I was still crying, self-indulgently (this actually takes priority over all other to-do list items at any given point in the day). The elderly chap said:
“Tough day?”
Me (mid-snivel): Yes
EC: You’ve just got to keep going. That’s all any of us can do.
Me (with a full-body sob): I just don’t know if I can
EC : You just have to. We ain’t got no choice. I’ve got bowel cancer. I’m going to die in hospital. But you just have to keep going.
Well that’s fucking told me.
The elderly chap is still talking to me whilst wrestling with his mask. He’s softly-spoken and is now muffled through a gauze strip, so I shuffle down the steps to hear him better.
His name is Benedict and he’s 68. He looks older. We speak for a while, he’s easy to talk to. He was married for 25 years to a lady called Nanette. They met at the Maudsley, so presumably Benedict has battled with his mental health for a very long time. I wonder, fleetingly, whether I’ll meet The Next Guy at the Maudsley. The hopelessness intensifies for a second and I banish the thought by carrying on chatting to Benedict. I ask how Nanette had died.
“She just… died. She was there. Then she wasn’t. They couldn’t ever explain it. We had 25 good years though. I miss her. I miss her every day.”
I express sincere condolences and ask if she was buried, so he can visit her grave. He shakes his head sadly and says she was cremated “and then I moved, and I forgot to dig up her ashes. So I lost them. I’ve got a nice photo of the two of us together though. So I look at that and remember her”. He gazes into the distance for a little while, looking desolate and frail.
He tells me, unasked, that he was in the army for 17 years “that’s why I dress like this” and the importance of discipline and routine. I admire how clean his boots are “Yep. still clean ’em every day. Like I was taught in the army. They were sparkling, now look at ’em – all ruined from the rain”. His boots are immaculate, there are a few drops of water drying slowly on each.
He talks at length about his giant cat, Minxy, and what a comfort he is. He takes Minxy to the café where they eat breakfast every day (whilst Benedict is scrupulously clean, thick wafts of chip fat emanate from him constantly), but since Minxy bit the lady owner of the café, she’s not keen on the cat, so Benedict keeps him on a little leash.
Two mental health workers arrive to collect Benedict. One knows him, the other is new to him. The new one is awkwardly jovial, patronising.
As he gets up to leave, Benedict turns to me and says “It’ll be alright girl. Just keep going”. He disappears through the same double doors as every other passer-by and it strikes me what a loss it will be to the world the day that Benedict dies of bowel cancer in hospital.
I’m left with little time to ponder this further as Alana has arrived, with a psychiatrist by her side. She’s as warm and smiley in person as she had been over the phone. The doctor (Charles) is younger and less stern that I was expecting, but still with enough gravitas that I’m not worried he’s wandered into the hospital having got lost on his paper round or anything.
It’s our turn through the double doors. I try not to worry that we’re yet to see anyone that’s gone through them come back out again yet. With Anna by my side, the four of us walk down corridors that smell like every hospital you’ve ever been in: warm air carrying whiffs of institutional cooking and disinfectant. It transpires that we’re going to ‘The Sanctuary’ as there are no meeting rooms available.
‘The Sanctuary’ is a room with wooden floors; wooden chairs stacked up high against one wall. It’s used as an inter-denominational faith room and has corresponding religious symbols of every possible permutation across another of the walls. Judaism, Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism – they’re all there, along with some others that I don’t recognise. My guess is you go and stand in front of the one that corresponds to your personal belief system. I wonder if I lie prone across the wall whether I can channel all the various deities at once and perhaps dilute some of my despair. I don’t have time to test this theory out, however, as it’s time for ALL MY PAIN again.
Alana eases us all in by explaining her and Charles’ roles and what the AHT team do. Then Charles is very keen to start by digging further into the role my job has played in all of this. I realise that we have to go all the way back to 2015 to get to the beginning of the various stresses that would eventually lead me to breaking point right now. So, back to 2015 I go, through 2016 and 2017 and 2018 and 2019 to 2020, each year piling on further strain. I do most of the talking, but there are gentle questions from Charlie, the answers to which highlight to us – but to me most of all – just how rough this ride has been.
We go back over everything that I’d covered with Bola, but from some different angles and supplementing it with the megamix of delight that is my complicated relationship with my parents. On and on we go. It’s not difficult for me – it’s like an exam where I know all the answers and it pours out of me once more.
Have I ever felt this way before? No
Have I ever been depressed before? No
Any mental health issues? Other than the anxiety Jan-Mar 2020 (and, arguably, perhaps Jan-Oct 2020), no
Did I ever hear voices? No
Have I ever cut myself or self-harmed in any way? No
The idea of self harm is an absolute anathema to me. Which I appreciate might seem weird for someone who’s currently blogging extensively about how much I want to kill myself. The thing is – and please do bear with me – I think of the cutters and self-harmers to be mentally ill in a way that I don’t relate to. If your suffering is so great that only pain will anaesthetise it, then you are in serious need of help. To me, killing myself is the way to make the pain stop. I can’t imagine inflicting it on myself. That said, I mentally torture myself minute-by-minute with thoughts of The Guy (and I have a habit of scratching away at any painful thoughts until I find a way to fix them), so maybe I’m as intent on self-harm as the cutters, but I’m leaving the scars on my brain rather than on my limbs.
How serious is my intent: Very. I believe I’ve made the decision, I’m just waiting to settle on a method
What is the current risk to myself: Intention: high risk, Method: low. Suicide is hard, guys.
Throughout all of this, Alana has looked on, nodding reassuringly and somehow conveying absolute empathy without saying a word.
And then it’s time for the verdict. The diagnosis is in from Dr Charlie. Just how fucked am I, exactly? And the answer is: pretty fucked.
Essentially, in his (let’s face it, highly-qualified) opinion, I burned through potentially years-worth of emotional resilience in the first few months of the 2020, leaving me utterly defenceless against the various slings and arrows that then came my way throughout the rest of the year. He said my brain was exhausted and that what I needed was a rest.
I acknowledged that I was so fucking tired, all the time, and that suicide seemed the only way I could turn my brain off. My very great brain. We’d been friends for a long time and it was the source of most of my successes in life. But it had had enough and it was choosing the fastest route out, taking rest of me with it.
The doctor continues, telling me that he believes I have a very high chance of recovery. He says that this type of thing is relatively common in highly self-reliant people (of whom I am inarguably, inimitably, infuriatingly one). I nod in recognition as he describes a pattern of behaviour where such personalities just keep going, way past the point where others would ask for help. To the point where recovery seems impossible and overwhelming. Exactly as I feel, right now. He tells me that the feelings that I’m having are as a result of a very deep depression and that I can – and will – get better. He says it would be a very great shame if I were to take my life.
I tell him that I feel as though I’ve crashed into a wall very, very hard. But that now I wonder if I’ve been in that car for a while.
I say that I’m worried that, having never had prior mental health issues, if (and this is the largest IF in the history of ifs. You’d have to express the font number in googols) I get through this torrid period, this will now be something that I struggle with for the rest of my newly-elongated life. Because I am *not* up for that. Dr Charlie tells me (and I believe him) that, typically, in cases like mine, this will be a one-off.
He talks through various medication options in a way that is clear and thorough. I’ll take an anti-depressant, which will take effect within 2-6 weeks. I’ll start on 15mg for 2 weeks, then 30mg with the possibility of increasing to 45mg depending on how I’m getting on by then. The idea of even being here in 4 weeks’ time isn’t something I’m even really contemplating at this point, but sure, let’s see how it goes. I’m also having relatively short courses of sleeping pills and anti-anxiety pills (the latter to be taken ‘as needed’ – no more than 4 a day) to ease me into proceedings somewhat.
I’ll carry on being looked after by AHTT. They can either come and see me daily (if I’m in Southwark) or I can go into them (if staying with friends or I have a sudden, burning urge to sit in traffic on the Old Kent Road for 20 mins). They’ll monitor my progress and, at some point, I’ll be moved down the severity levels and will eventually stride boldly into a bright new future. Or something.
So there we are. There’s a plan. And medical science certainly seems to think that I have an excellent chance of being right as rain at some point. And that’ll need to be enough, for now, because I still don’t see myself being able to turn this shit into Shinola.
We all leave. I’m drained. And there’s that slight awkwardness of having just shared an incredibly intimate experience together, but now we’re walking down a corridor and talking about the weather. I suspect: only in England…
Anna and I have to wait in reception for some meds to be sourced. I’m about to be A Person Taking Anti-Depressants. I’m actually fine with this – I do genuinely believe in chemical imbalances in the brain and that these can be corrected. I’m just still not convinced that this is my issue. I just want out. IT’S THE LOGICAL THING TO DO. Good lord, I’m exhausting. No wonder I’m tired.
As we wait, a genuine snaggle-toothed old crone walks up to us. Central Casting would want this woman for the inevitable next live-action remake Snow White in a heartbeat.
She’d been a notable presence in reception all morning, apparently working as a fire marshal, if her uniform was anything to go by. Now she was back and with renewed vigour. She told Anna and I she had to take our temperatures, delighted to have been put in charge of the digital thermometer that she was lurching towards us with. Standing mere inches away, mask lowered as far as her clavicle, she took our temperatures, then asked us whether the results were high or not. And what constituted a high temperature. And what she thought we should do if someone with a ‘high’ temperature came in. And yet Benedict and I were the lunatics in here?? The very nerve of it all.
Anyway, my drugs arrived and with them came a shift change from Anna to Chris and yet another Uber home. Chris had come all the way from Amersham, expecting to go straight to my flat and instead had had to brave TFL during a pandemic to find his way to the glamour of Denmark Hill. Chris had been a legendary logistician in the background. He’d been in daily contact with my mum, was mobilising the WhatsApp group forces to try to fill any gaps in my schedule and still found time to call or message me several times a day to tell me to just hang in there, it would be ok.
We went back to my flat. I ate some soup. We both cried (it wasn’t the soup’s fault). And that’s about the last thing that I remember clearly about Wednesday. The last 10 hours of Wednesday and the 48 hours that followed are a fog of people and medication. Huge chunks are missing. And my memory is usually legendary. I’ll sketch out what I can, for completeness, but it’s all about to go a bit hazy.
Next post though, will be something a little different. You’ll probably like it. Unless you’re in it. Or not in it. You’ll see 🙂
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