Look. Tomorrow will be one month since I've been back in the mental health ward. Is there a Hallmark card for that? Probably. I didn't want to tell you because it got quite serious this time but I've been doing some stuff, reducing some meds, and coming to the conclusion that if I don't stand up out of my filthy sinkhole of violent depression I will go under. And I have beautiful boys ... LOTS of beautiful boys. All my life I've wondered and been sad about the men I never had, and suddenly I look up to the see the men in my life who I *do* have. And they're beyond beautiful. And I just had to stop then and take my glasses off so I could cry really hard. You know what that means? That means it's impossible to blog and cry at the same time. People ask me why I blog and I cannot answer, there are too many reasons. One of them is to know I'm not alone.
The first few nights here were spent in emergency (I'm totally fine now) and I woke up with a giant adult diaper on. And I needed to go to the loo and the nurse said, "Just use your diaper." And I thought, there is NO way this one diaper can contain my man wee but I had no other fucking option. I text my sister later that I was fine, and I pissed in a diaper. And it felt kind of good.
So over to the mental unit I came. My mum drove up and missed work all week to look after my boys and cook and be with me. After everything she'd been through, I hated myself for making her, making everyone worry. I can't keep ending up in here. This time has been so intense, like I knew, I finally realised how not well I was.
I dreamt about Cam last night. I was in the back seat of a car and he climbed in and my heart it just ballooned and then I realised that he was eight years old, but I was my current age. And I had to let him go through his whole life and not change a thing. It was really hard. It felt so good to feel his leg against my leg.
Dave is completely amazing. Usually at the end of my time here I sense a bit of antsy, like, he's running a business and cooking meals and looking after the boys all by himself. But he's done all that and still doing it and we're still saying we love each other and I can't wait to get out and breathe his breath. Opie has been fantastic timing for the boys. I can't wait to get out. I'm nervous about doing things differently but I'll just do them a day at a time.
I need to convince myself that getting back up and living my life isn't leaving Cam behind. Which will be one of the hardest things I've ever done.
Sucks having mental health problems. I really do have bipolar. It's taken me a year to accept it. When I'm not on medication I feel very weird and manic but then go mostly down, down, down.
Mental health nurses are a special breed and I'm grateful to all of them. They've seen it all and don't bat an eyelid. Some of them are arseholes. But that's ok - I'm a bit of an arsehole.
There's been a lot of lying on my bed. The days go pretty slowly around here, and if I don't find things to do I feel yuck. I'm doing a workbook on practical things I can think about or do when I'm feeling down. My therapist has come in every Thursday for counselling. He asked me what I would have done if he'd given me a workbook on the first day of seeing him and I told him I never would have seen him again and we both laughed. Then I cried about something and there were no tissues so he gave me his hankie which made me cry a bit more. I'll buy him some new ones because I'm never giving this one back. It's been a long time since a man gave me a hankie. He'd even ironed it.
I wish I was in here with Cameron Morrissey. I wish I was in here with Charlotte Dawson. I wish I was in here with the seven people who are going to kill themselves in Australia tomorrow. It's weird talking about suicide, like you're not supposed to? But so many of us think about it a lot.
So what would I do with all my suicidal people tomorrow? I'd run a group. But a really fucken kick-arse group that wasn't boring and I'd ask everyone what their favourite movies were and why and I'd cook popcorn properly on the stovetop and chuck beanbags all over the floor and put Pulp Fiction on. And we'd all laugh and say the dialogue and spill the popcorn and all of us would feel connected to humanity. And that would make them not do it for that one day.
::
Lastly, I'd like to thank my door.
He's really helped me through - smiled at me, laughed, told me I could do this.
"Eden, you can do this."
Ok door. Let's do it.
The first few nights here were spent in emergency (I'm totally fine now) and I woke up with a giant adult diaper on. And I needed to go to the loo and the nurse said, "Just use your diaper." And I thought, there is NO way this one diaper can contain my man wee but I had no other fucking option. I text my sister later that I was fine, and I pissed in a diaper. And it felt kind of good.
So over to the mental unit I came. My mum drove up and missed work all week to look after my boys and cook and be with me. After everything she'd been through, I hated myself for making her, making everyone worry. I can't keep ending up in here. This time has been so intense, like I knew, I finally realised how not well I was.
I dreamt about Cam last night. I was in the back seat of a car and he climbed in and my heart it just ballooned and then I realised that he was eight years old, but I was my current age. And I had to let him go through his whole life and not change a thing. It was really hard. It felt so good to feel his leg against my leg.
Dave is completely amazing. Usually at the end of my time here I sense a bit of antsy, like, he's running a business and cooking meals and looking after the boys all by himself. But he's done all that and still doing it and we're still saying we love each other and I can't wait to get out and breathe his breath. Opie has been fantastic timing for the boys. I can't wait to get out. I'm nervous about doing things differently but I'll just do them a day at a time.
I need to convince myself that getting back up and living my life isn't leaving Cam behind. Which will be one of the hardest things I've ever done.
Sucks having mental health problems. I really do have bipolar. It's taken me a year to accept it. When I'm not on medication I feel very weird and manic but then go mostly down, down, down.
Mental health nurses are a special breed and I'm grateful to all of them. They've seen it all and don't bat an eyelid. Some of them are arseholes. But that's ok - I'm a bit of an arsehole.
There's been a lot of lying on my bed. The days go pretty slowly around here, and if I don't find things to do I feel yuck. I'm doing a workbook on practical things I can think about or do when I'm feeling down. My therapist has come in every Thursday for counselling. He asked me what I would have done if he'd given me a workbook on the first day of seeing him and I told him I never would have seen him again and we both laughed. Then I cried about something and there were no tissues so he gave me his hankie which made me cry a bit more. I'll buy him some new ones because I'm never giving this one back. It's been a long time since a man gave me a hankie. He'd even ironed it.
I wish I was in here with Cameron Morrissey. I wish I was in here with Charlotte Dawson. I wish I was in here with the seven people who are going to kill themselves in Australia tomorrow. It's weird talking about suicide, like you're not supposed to? But so many of us think about it a lot.
So what would I do with all my suicidal people tomorrow? I'd run a group. But a really fucken kick-arse group that wasn't boring and I'd ask everyone what their favourite movies were and why and I'd cook popcorn properly on the stovetop and chuck beanbags all over the floor and put Pulp Fiction on. And we'd all laugh and say the dialogue and spill the popcorn and all of us would feel connected to humanity. And that would make them not do it for that one day.
::
Lastly, I'd like to thank my door.
He's really helped me through - smiled at me, laughed, told me I could do this.
"Eden, you can do this."
Ok door. Let's do it.
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Write to be understood, speak to be heard. - Lawrence Powell