Applauding myself and keeping going with a smile on my (red) face in spite of it all!

I’m jumping back in where I am, and trying not to get bogged down by trying to fill in the gaps. This post will be part explanation and part celebration.

Why the celebration? Don’t get too excited, this won’t be the average person’s idea of celebration. This is a #spoonie celebration, that’s celebrating every achievement when times are difficult due to chronic illness to remind yourself that you’re a legend … 😀 ! This is particularly important to me because I have so little in the way of support, still waiting on social services – less said about that the better right now, and keeping going on your own in the face of so much can be very very tough. This is like being my own ‘cheerleader’ 🙂 .

I was woken by the phone just before 9am today. I felt dreadful. My night was a bit of blur but I remembered that it had been marked by nightmares and night sweats. I spent a lot of time going to and fro the loo, thanks to a bad bowel flare. I also felt nauseous and clammy, and the fatigue that has particularly plagued me recently was still present. Thankfully it wasn’t so bad as yesterday when I had to go back to bed at lunchtime because I couldn’t stay awake and kept falling over, but this morning five minutes or so of activity warranted rest afterwards.

I’ve just realised that my face is showing signs of that horrible flare up again, the one that happened several times a few weeks ago. At its worst my face ballooned and I could barely open my eyes. Earlier today I thought something didn’t look quite right when I glanced in the mirror but couldn’t pinpoint anything specific. Now it’s looking increasingly red, particularly around my eyes and mouth, as before, and under my chin, and it has begun to itch … *dashes off to take an anti-histamine*.

I do generally feel like a I’m in a ‘flare’ of some sort. I ache, I’m lurching between insomnia and the most crushing fatigue, I have too little energy (hence no treadmill tales of late – I’m desperate to run but at the moment have no capacity to do so) and my digestive disorder (Bile Acid Malabsorption) is seemingly flaring unexpectedly and very badly. There’s also the nausea, hot flushes, clamminess and night sweats, and I’ve been experiencing violent mood swings lately, not at all like me, resulting in sudden and very severe depressions. I lost six days to one last week, things got very desperate and I became actively suicidal at its peak. I’ll cover that a little more in a separate post. I strongly suspect at least some of the symptoms to be due to a hormonal issue, likely a particularly impactful perimenopause, but I don’t know if that’s true of all of them. I would like to know what’s going on and I’d certainly like to feel better. All recent blood tests apparently indicated that all is well …

I’m conscious of not wanting to make this a long post, and of the need to take off my make up and apply some of the dreaded steroid cream since my face has begun to flare again. I have no idea what is behind these flares, but still suspect something systemic. I wasn’t wearing any make up at the time of the original incidences of this, and today I’m wearing minimal make up, nothing new, that I’ve worn a lot recently without incident.

Today’s achievements

• Shower/Dress
• Meds
• Therapy session
• Too nauseous to eat breakfast but made a lovely post-therapy brunch
• Answered the phone twice – first a wrong number, a lot of people seem to think that I am a fancy hotel in a neighbouring district (!), second time it was the tradesperson who’d arrived to carry out annual safety checks for my landlord but then couldn’t work out which entry buzzer was the one for my flat, so rang to be allowed in!
• Created a new label for my buzzer on the door entry panel, to replace the previous one which had worn off, and stuck it firmly in place when I went down to take out my rubbish
• Started an online art therapy course – completing the first six lectures
• Did a lot of work in my bullet journal
• Dealt with my pharmacy delivery – ‘Pharmacy Bob’ was as lovely as ever.
• Emptied and refilled the dishwasher
• Put on a load of laundry – phew, looks like I just escaped having to start going commando … !
• Booked a cab to get me from a physiotherapy to a dental appointment on Friday. The physio is squeezing me in, it’s the only space she had, but it leaves me with just 10mins to get to my appointment at the dentist – hence the cab and a need for me to shout, ‘Step on the gas, my man!’ (not really 🙂 )

Still to do

• Report leaking dishwasher
• Hang laundry
• Make this recipe – hopefully it will be a bit of a treat
• Evening Routine

 

‘Painsomnia’ and a painful mind

Yesterday was, to be frank, a bit rubbish. Pain disturbed my sleep on Monday and kept me awake for the greater part of the night. Lack of sleep caused other physical symptoms to flare; this ‘symptom siege’ coupled with fatigue, felled my body but allowed my mind the freedom to perform a fandango!

Fandango

noun

1.  a lively Spanish dance for two people, typically accompanied by castanets or tambourine.
2. an elaborate or complicated process or activity.

There were no castanets or tambourines. This was more lively storm, than jamboree. Grief was first to step onto the floor and whirled around with emotional pain, anger and depression in the ‘fandango’ that was my mind trying to process recent events and their relationship to the abuse and trauma I experienced in the past. This is, as I’ve said previously, a welcome process but it is painful. This is especially true when it occurs unbidden AND when support – which is twofold (someone/some people with the experience, professional or otherwise, to help you with the process and someone/some people who can listen, be kind and offer a hug – essentially comfort you) – isn’t readily available.

My interim therapist is on leave this week – 12-12:50pm on Wednesdays is my usual session time. I say interim because it’s not ideal. I’m accessing therapy via weekly telephone sessions via a mental health charity, while I’m continuing the, to date, 17 month wait for trauma therapy on the NHS. I’m due to be assessed on 10th July so that the NHS may decide what, if anything, will be offered to me.

I actually don’t have clear recall of all of the ‘processing’ that my mind got up to yesterday.  A lot can happen in a short space of time – it can be a violent but relatively short-lived ‘storm’. My lack of recall could be because …

• There was a lot going on – too much to fully take in
• My memory was impacted by the low mood that came with the storm
• In the absence of ready support, my mind ‘shut down’ or has ‘dissociated’ from the thoughts and feelings involved because of their traumatic/distressing nature

I know that suicidal thoughts occurred. Please know that on this occasion no action is required in response to those; I am safe. These were passive thoughts. There was no active planning, there wasn’t even a desire to die, this was a sense that perhaps suicide might ultimately be my only option because of the pain and the difficulties I face. The feelings passed and I don’t have any suicidal thoughts or feelings at the moment.

I know that I was at times distressed because of new understanding regarding my abuse. I know that I cried, which is still something I can’t do easily.

I know that at least one point I felt real anger about what was done to me. I very rarely feel anger. In fact, last year a psychotherapist suggested that I might translate anger into guilt and so feel that instead. This makes some sense to me but is something that I’ve yet to explore.

I managed to sleep better last night. I don’t know what caused Monday night’s severe pain. I don’t think I had done too much. The only ‘new’ activity was the wee stroll that I took up to the shop and the postbox at the top of my road. It won’t stop me trying again, but I have to be mindful that, at the moment, this may be a pain trigger.

I was able to get up within an hour or so of waking, and shower and dress. I was about to type that I was looking forward to a visit from a friend this afternoon … when she arrived an hour early … so here I am again, post-visit. We had a lovely afternoon, a really good natter and catch up. She brought fancy biscuits that went down well with our cuppas 🙂 and some lovely flowers. I really love flowers and was just thrilled.

We haven’t known each other very long, but I think this has the makings of a good friendship. I think of her as a ‘breath of fresh air’. It’s taken me a long time to understand that I have a tendency to attract people who are drawn to my energy and enthusiasm … but who want to ride on the back of it, weighing me down. This friend has energy and enthusiasm and a ‘grab life by the horns’ attitude to match mine. She’s keen to introduce me to some of her friends – one, a former GP, who writes and the other a fellow trauma survivor who loves arts and crafts as much as I do. I look forward to meeting them both.

I had thought of taking another wee stroll today, but decided against it, my friend was here for three hours. I’ve been doing laundry and chores, and writing, and I’ve still to do my treadmill time and prep a stuffed pepper to throw into the oven for dinner. I’m having it with some microwaveable broccoli ‘rice’… it’s good, honestly! Hopefully, I’ve just enough ‘spoons’ left to accomplish that.

I had some news earlier from the social worker that wasn’t great, but not terrible, we’ll cover that in another post.

Thanks for reading.

TTFN,

Heart x

 

 

Heart set on dying?

I want to die. I really want to die. I just want this to end.

Those thoughts have been uppermost after months of waxing and waning. I’ve continued to fight but my ongoing deterioration is undeniable.

I long for someone to tell me to sit down, to say ‘let me do it’, to take the strain if only for a few moments, and for them to bring me a cup of tea and a sandwich. I long for someone to let me curl up under some ‘comforter’ and pour it all out. I LONG to feel connection to someone. I long to be heard. I long for kindness and support. I long not to have to do everything by myself, to be able to stop having to continually fight horrors alone. I long not to feel that on occasion I have to inappropriately ask support of people who should not be giving it, because I am desperate. Like the person you know only to nod hello to at work only to then find yourself suddenly having to ask them to wash your smalls or some other indignity – and no, I haven’t actually done that one. I long to be asked: What do you need? What would help right now? and to feel that the person asking was willing to try, amid their own limitations be they geographical, health or time or otherwise related, to try to work with me to make some progress.

At some point during the night, a friend on hearing of my suicidal despair told me to ‘stay with him’ and that we’d ‘try to find a way through’. Such powerful words when you’ve lost hope and need something to which to CLING. Those are just the words you need from friends at the worst of times. Certainly I was glad to hear them, only I couldn’t take comfort in them.

We have never met. We live many miles apart. We are online friends, although we have come to chat on the phone in recent months. I haven’t had the gut feeling that there is something to fear from the friendship and that it would be dangerous for me to proceed, as I’ve had many times in the last 15 years. I trust my ‘gut’ but have forced myself to ignore it since loss and illness narrowed my world to such an extent that I came to feel that this ‘beggar’ couldn’t afford to be choosy. Every time my gut instinct proved right but not before I’d paid the price for ignoring it. This friend, of last night’s words, and I have some shared experience and this friend undeniably has empathy. Although it’s a relatively new friendship, this person appears to have a good grasp of what I’m about and a reasonable grasp of my complex circumstances. Finally, after the last year, too many damaging encounters and friends who have betrayed my trust have left me unable to trust and connect. I can now only see that this friend, and any others, will come to stop caring.

One thing I know about you is that this isn’t your fault, more that it’s an unholy concoction of circumstances … You’re my friend and I’m very proud to know you. How can this friend – an ordinary bloke, said with no disrespect but a worry that perhaps I am under-estimating – say that where other friends can not? If older friends* – those in whom I can still feel something, could say words like this, the power would be extraordinary and could catapult me into new connections with some confidence. Does anyone understand what I mean? If people who have known me for years, who were once very close to me can’t say/act like that I matter, on top of the betrayals of family, can I ever really matter to anyone else? *They are now so very few, admittedly this is a very small sample.

It seems ‘crazy’ to think that when my abuse was first revealed more than 15 years ago and I became so very ill, I consoled myself with the thought that friends would rally …
I didn’t expect that I would lose so many of them because they couldn’t or wouldn’t understand and so rejected me, or found my situation too uncomfortable and so distanced themselves. I pushed away the stragglers who remained on the periphery, too terrified to confide for fear of more of the same. A few years ago I reconnected with one such friend lost in that way, someone I valued very much and trusted, but ultimately there is now only more distance. This is alienation in the truest sense, my situation and suffering (I hate to apply that word to me; it feels to reek of self pity) too alien to comprehend, and waaaaay too alien to ever want to embrace. I long for that ’embrace’, some connection. I belong nowhere …
It seems crazy because in spite of all that, deep down inside somewhere the desire for friends to rally still lives on.

Picture me, if you will, clinging to a perilously lofty cliff face with no safety lines and ever-crumbling hand and footholds, frequently flailing, slipping and falling, before grasping and clinging on again by the merest margin.

I want to let go. I want nothingness to engulf me.

Count your ‘pegs’, or whatever climbers call those things that they tap into rock, your ‘ harness’ and other ‘safety lines’, for me now, will you, please? Perhaps there’s a spouse or partner, a pet, a home of your own, children, a job, sufficient income, food in your fridge, connections and pleasures, colleagues, friends, wider family, history and memories, a safe place, a trusted professional. Things that amid stress, and even at the worst of times, to which you can cling and feel grounded, tethered, held in place – pinned to that cliff face even though you are terrified, even though your predicament is hellish, you are held in place. I ask this because in all these years I have never yet encountered any other ‘struggler’ without tethers. Plenty who can feel that they are without them, who can struggle to see them, yes, but no one without any in actuality. A GP once told me that those people never make it. I like to defy odds but in the last year I have feared I’ve been stupid in my dogged belief that I could.

Fantasies and fear are my only ‘tethers’. I want to write more on this but I’m flagging. I’ll try to do it in another post, except to say that in the absence of psychosis and with depression only rarely removing my rationale, I fear a suicide attempt failing and landing me in a worse situation. I’m not living, I’m existing, but I’m failing to die.

I live with the knowledge that if I were to go missing there is no one to notice or to raise an alarm, and that if I were to die it could be weeks before I would be found. I don’t dream up these thoughts to dwell or wallow or feel sorry for myself. They are facts I’ve been forced to face in the last couple of years. Realisation slow in the making but helped along by having to beg a near stranger to help me to get to A&E in December and the days that I’ve gone without food since 2015, either through lack of funds or lack of capacity due to illness to prepare something, because there was no one willing to help – for eight days at worst. It’s immensely difficult to lay bare these examples as the circumstances surrounding them are complex and there is much left unsaid. I fear misunderstanding and negative judgement.

I’d never heard those words before last night, not in all those years or the preceding years of abuse and trauma. Not one of the people I loved and cared about ever said those words or any remotely like them. I’ve said those words VERY many times. I’ve actually lost count of the number of times I dealt with someone else’s suicidal crisis between 2011 and 2016 alone. I have quite a record and, given that I’m not a Samaritans volunteer or mental health professional, it’s probably a fairly unusual one. I jump in, a LOT, always hoping to make a positive difference but sometimes for misguided, even unhealthy, reasons, mostly a desperate need to try to prevent others feeling what I feel.

I have had not a single regret that I cut myself off from what remained of my family as it was only, and could only ever be, abusive. Likewise I have never regretted leaving my marriage a little over three years ago. It was dysfunctional, deeply unhealthy for the most part and has been described by others as sometimes being abusive; I find it difficult to claim that. The hugs were wonderful, as sometimes was the kindness and the connection, but the damage it was doing, ultimately to both of us, was too great. I am sad that illness and my circumstances have isolated me. I am angry that chronic under-funding of health and social care has killed many and severely worsened my own health and circumstances leaving me to suffer acutely, unnecessarily, and unable to ‘grab life by the horns’ and thrive. Again, that’s so difficult to say. Ultimately, I’ve been rendered housebound for the past four months – no longer able to leave my flat either psychologically or physically due to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and issues of pain, fatigue and mobility.

Inside my mind I am as proactive as ever, as hard working, as determined, as enthusiastic, as ‘can do’, as ‘grab life by the horns’ but now mostly only when I unconsciously dissociate from reality. Reality that includes a sick body; a mind tormented by loss, grief , loneliness and desperate desire to thrive; hunger; and isolation so complete that I don’t know when I’ll next see or speak to another human, and I’m struggling to remember when I last saw someone. I am permanently online, often now too lost to connect to anyone but still ‘seeing’ the world, if only virtually, remains a sort of tether but one without comfort. Without it these past few months, I think I would already be dead. It’s kept me from completely losing my mind.

I hoped that writing this would provide some sort of catharsis. I have written it to try to let it out of my head. I have written it while trying not to try to hard, trying not to think of the audience or worry who might judge, feel offended or otherwise react negatively. Part of me doesn’t want to receive comments on this post but another part cannot allow me to enter my WordPress ‘dashboard’ and turn off that function on this post. I fear judgement and disdain. I fear troubling anyone. Another part wants people who know me to read this post, and wants to find ways to encourage that. I know I welcome questions and would welcome the attempts of others, especially my friends, to learn and understand. I am thoughtful and reflective and my depth of insight is frequently noted but I think I may currently lack the wherewithal to isolate my motivations, comprehend and marshal them in my best interests. Perhaps I am setting myself up for more hurt? Part of me feels that I should let people grow ever distant, set them free.

I have continued to engage with my online friend since we connected late last night. I am in the sitting room at my desk writing this post. I emailed my recently allocated social worker, ostensibly my key worker, around 8 this morning to let her know that I am in dire straits. I have been told there is nothing that can be offered right now, but I forced myself to ask her directly if there is anything at all  that she could do to help me at this time. Occasionally, pushing hard reveals that actually something is possible, but my experience is that pushing alone, however skillfully, is rarely enough. You’re easily dismissed when alone and without others to back you. I had to do something having failed to find the courage to attempt to kill myself. I’ve not yet received a reply but continue to compulsively check my email. She might even be on leave. The working day is all but over as I write this sentence, at any rate.

I could say more; I still feel compulsive urges to do so, particularly around the suicidal ideation, and also expanding on reasons for the dearth of support, in a desperate attempt to make readers understand. I shall refrain from doing so, and deploy my inner ‘Tigger‘ to publish and be damned.

Final note: I have just received a reply from the social worker. It is kind enough but offers no support, just tells me to keep keeping on by myself and reminds me of the usual crisis lines. I will try to write specifically about the health and social care support situation soon.

Thank you for reading.

Back from the brink

TW: This post discusses depression and suicidal intent.

It’s been almost two months since my last post, so much for my daily blogging plans 😀 !

I laugh, but in truth I have been very ill.

There is a lot that I’d like to say and I hope to do this in a series of bite-sized posts, rather than in one overwhelmingly massive missive! These posts may appear daily, weekly, alone or in clusters. Who knows? I’m taking life one day at a time, and doing what I can each day. All I can say for sure is that I will be blogging, now that I’m able to function again.

I am happy that my capacity to function is restored to me and to be making progress, slowly but surely.

It was a strange feeling as I started to come out of the depths of the depression, to be able to feel something other than that I had to die.

I have a lot of knowledge about mental health and mental illness and I’m very self aware, but I became so ill that I lost all perspective. I am naturally relentlessly positive and have boundless enthusiasm. I’ve previously described myself as ‘a bit Tigger‘. Depression takes that from me. At its worst, it strips me of all capacity to function and to see anything other than suicide as a realistic option for me.

Glad though I was to emerge from those terrible depths, as the days progressed and my mood began to improve, I became aware just how bad things had been and I had to start to process the knowledge that I’d been dangerously ill. I hadn’t been able to wash, dress myself or clean my teeth. I either barely ate or ate poorly. I struggled to engage with anyone or anything. I couldn’t engage with my crisis plan or crisis support, for to do so seemed utterly futile. I experienced feelings of self loathing that I had thought were long behind me. I could see only that I had to die.

Indeed I did plan to die. I am immensely grateful that one friend became worried enough to contact my GP … on the day I planned to make a suicide attempt, although she wasn’t aware of that. It took persistence on the part of my doctor, repeated telephone calls and voice mail, before I could find the capacity to answer the phone to her that day, but all that gave me pause. Our eventual conversation was difficult but helpful and led to her visiting me at home the next day, as I was unable to get to the surgery. A new path unfurled before me. Things were going to change.

 

 

 

 

This cannot be fixed by relentless positivity and boundless enthusiasm.

I turned a corner again yesterday.

The previous three days – Friday, Saturday and Sunday – were incredibly difficult; hellish. Lying in bed in the early hours of this morning, trying to switch off and sleep, I found myself feeling as though someone else had lived those three days. I had some memories from those days and yet, in those moments lying in my bed, it didn’t feel as though the me lying in bed was the same me who lived through those three hellish days. I haven’t considered it as deeply since, I’m slightly afraid to do so.

I was certainly very depressed during those three days, triggered by further bad news about my financial circumstances that has, for now at least, eradicated all hope of avoiding becoming homeless in December – with nowhere to go or stay. It is a harsh reality. Coming after so much loss – almost entirely due to the abuse I endured in childhood and beyond – losing all family, friends, my career, previous good health, the chance to have children, my marriage, independence, a significant amount of memory, even a not inconsiderable amount of hair due to alopecia, and more related to those losses – the prospect of further loss is terrifying. More than that, it’s unbearable.

I’ve survived all the rest and coped, often alone, I feel unable to cope now. Finally I’m saying I can’t take any more. Despite intensive efforts, I’ve as yet been unable to find support to avoid this feared loss becoming reality. I need a miracle …

In that terribly depressed state during those three days and yesterday too, before I really started to emerge from it, I was more readily accepting of that harsh reality. I am generally a realist. I don’t tend to shy away from harsh realities or stick my head in the sand.

The me that has emerged, from those three days and more, is still very much aware of the horrid reality that I’m facing. It’s a me that is still very much depleted and strugging, but it’s not deeply depressed. That ‘not-deeply depressed’ me (something far closer to the essence of me – some might call that my ‘authentic self’) wants to go ‘Tigger’…

You remember? A.A. Milne’s terrific tiger with boing. He of relentless positivity and boundless enthusiasm. I’m a bit Tigger, certainly relentlessly positive and possessed of boundless enthusiasm, deep depression notwithstanding. Lying in bed last night, thinking as I was, I felt Tigger me, desperately wanting to find hope, desperately wanting to find a way to live.

With the best will in the world and despite having ‘where’s there’s a will, there’s a way’ as a life maxim, logic tells me that I cannot Tigger my way out of this situation.

My own collection: Tigger is the one with THE tail, much as I am the one with a heck of a tale. I’m afraid that my story cannot have a happy ending.

‘Threatened’ suicide … is it OK to say that?

TW: repeated references to suicidal feelings and the act of suicide.

After seeing this article and its headline in my Twitter timeline, I tweeted to @HuffPostUK, I’m not sure about using the word ‘threatened’, I think it adds to stigma. How about ‘considered’ or ‘risked’?

If that sounds like a case for the ‘word police’, I’ll explain why I have concerns.

I think, as I subsequently tweeted, that ‘threatened’ is too close to ‘threatening’. Sadly, too many people still conflate mental illness with being a threat to others or generally dangerous, when actually people with mental health problems are more likely to be a risk to themselves, or, be a victim of violent crime (scroll down to the section titled ‘are people with mental health problems dangerous?’.)

You could threaten to punch someone – I wouldn’t personally but I hope you see my meaning! In that context the use of the word ‘threaten’ is accurate and appropriate. It is threatening behaviour. It is possible to threaten someone – the threat may not be carried out but the person on the receiving end of the threat can feel threatened regardless.

I’m also concerned that using the word ‘threaten’ in relation to suicide may inadvertently perpetuate a dangerous myth about it – by dangerous myth, I mean a misconception that can cost lives.

Suicide is a desperate act. People consider it for various reasons. Commonly, it isn’t because they want to die, but because they can see no other escape from desperate circumstances, they’re often experiencing unbearable pain. There are many myths surrounding suicide, including the idea that people who talk about it, aren’t serious about doing it. While it’s true that not everyone who experiences suicidal feelings will go on to die by suicide, suicidal feelings should always be taken seriously. It is vital to talk about suicide, talking can and does save lives.

I attempted suicide in my thirties. I survived by fighting with myself and managing at the last moment to call for help. I had already seen my then GP that morning and been sent home, after my suicidal feelings were dismissed, to be alone with lots of medication to hand. In a desperate and distressed state I believed I’d been sent home to die. I took a massive overdose that would have proved fatal, help arrived in the nick of time. I lost consciousness just as the first paramedic entered my home. I remember nothing more until I came around in intensive care. I was told I’d had to be resusciated soon after arriving at hospital. However, because I called for help. a now ex-friend of mine decided I was an attention-seeking fraud and liberally spread word to that effect, losing me other friends in the process. That person’s reaction to my suicide attempt was the responsibility of that person, but stigma in wider society does play a part.

Stigma contributes to discrimination. As someone once said mental illness does not discriminate and nor should you. It can affect anyone. Experiencing mental health problems is no picnic, people doing so are already disadvantaged by their illness and should not have to face further disadvantage as a result of stigma.

I think the use of the word ‘threatening’ in relation to a suicidal act could perpetuate the myth that many suicide attempts are ‘fake’ or that people who are ‘threatening suicide’ are simply attention seekers, because to threaten isn’t necessarily the same as carrying out.

You can learn more in this great article from the Samaritans on myths about suicide. 

The media has often added to and perpetuated stigma surrounding mental illness. The infamous ‘Bonkers Bruno‘ headline immediately springs to mind, but there have been many other examples. Researching an essay about risk in terms of mental health, earlier this year, I was able to find, in a matter of moments, numerous examples of news reports where mental illness was conflated with threatening, violent and dangerous behaviour, despite their being no evidence.

As someone with a background in journalism, it might seem hypocritical of me to criticise the media. I became a journalist because I love to write, communicate and campaign. I wanted to bring stories and issues that matter to people’s attention. I wanted to help to give a voice to the voiceless. With apologies for deploying a cliche, I wanted to make a difference. I have no time for sleazy, salacious or irresponsible journalism – actually, to me, that’s not journalism; it’s just tripe.

In my youth, I considered journalism a noble profession, much like being a teacher, a doctor, nurse or lawyer … ahem. I may have been a touch naive, I was surprised that many people were not impressed when I declared my profession.

To be clear, I don’t consider the @HuffPostUK article which prompted this post to be irresponsible but I would be delighted if they and others would consider my concerns.

@HuffPostUK haven’t yet replied to my tweet. If I do receive a reply I will edit this post to include any response.

Thanks for reading, I’d welcome your thoughts. You could comment on this post or tweet me @heartsetonlivin .

Further information about and help with suicidal feelings can be found here. 

Jack Monroe has given me, as a survivor of abuse, a freedom from fear and I really want to thank her.

I have never wanted to devour a recipe book. I don’t suppose they taste too good, do they? I have owned and perused many a cook book from slim guides to hefty tomes, by the lesser known and the ‘celebrity’ chef, offering everything from simple suppers, one pot dinners, veggie delights, vegan cooking made easy, low fat, low stress … low fun. No matter the brilliance within those pages, those books couldn’t excite me.

I’ve never found cooking in any way thrilling despite being far from devoid of enthusiasm generally (I’m something of a jump up and down, beam broadly and talk the hind legs off a donkey with great passion on many topics, type. Enthusiastic hardly covers it.). I do enjoy food. I’m mindful of the importance of healthy eating. I don’t want to rely on processed foods and have often wished I had a love of cooking from scratch.

My lack of excitement for cooking, stems from a lack of confidence rooted in an old fear. I recall the swipes, slaps, pokes, verbal batterings and other punishments that accompanied the cooking of my upbringing. Nothing I did, in learning to cook or otherwise, was ever deemed acceptable. I’ve worked hard to build self esteem and confidence, but my relationship with cooking remained affected. Perhaps because it’s such a fundamental skill, and I was for so long deemed incapable of even that. I instilled my ex-husband with the confidence to learn to cook, and mentored his efforts – planning menus, gathering ingredients and lovingly encouraging. Still I cooked without enjoyment, with a lot of fear and to no more than a basic level.

The blog, devotedly largely to cooking on an impossibly tight budget, I found at agirlcalledJack.com caused something of a stir. I refer not to the stir in the media or in a bowl filled with a magical mix of low cost kidney beans, a square of dark chocolate, tomato puree and a pinch of cumin. This was the makings of a stirring deep inside of me (ooer – I have heard tell that food can do that to some folks).  Instead of wishing that I could tackle these recipes, that I found I was avidly reading, or feeling that I ought to tackle them; I started to find that I wanted to tackle them. Soon I found that not only did I want to tackle one or two basic budget recipes, I wanted to tackle quite a few. Then came my first encounter with A Girl Called Jack – the book* …

I devoured it in one huge gulp, reading from cover to cover with mounting EXCITEMENT. I wanted to make these things, because they excited me and because, finally, I felt I could. Then, after cooking one day, I found myself thinking I enjoyed that, then it happened again … and again. Now I look forward to cooking and it seems I enjoy it every time and best of all the fear has gone and in its place is a growing confidence.

Jack, I can’t thank you enough for that.

I’m never going to be contestant on the Great British Bake Off. I haven’t baked consistently since the cookery lessons of my school days of the 70s and 80s. I have baked since then but with fear, little success and more than a dollop of self-judgement. Last week * wait for it * I made a banana loaf. No, really, I really did … and bloody good it was too! I searched the terms ‘easy low fat banana loaf’ and came to this recipe from the BBC Good Food website – a site I believe also inspired you, Jack. I have to say that if I can successfully complete this recipe, anyone could, but boy did I enjoy making it. I positively revelled in it. By the end I might as well have conquered Everest, such was my sense of accomplishment and new found baking confidence. I’ve made it twice more since and, thanks to a gift of some apples, next week plan to bake Jack’s Apple and Cinnamon loaf.

A slice of MY banana loaf to sustain me as I write

As someone who lives with a number of diagnoses of chronic illness and is a ‘spoonie’, the amount of energy required to make a meal is of real importance. Before Jack, for two years (trying not to eat rubbish) I relied largely on expensive ready meals and ultimately, so burnt out was I, ended up living by snacking, not healthy, not good for the waistline and not at all satisfying or sustaining. My dysfunctional marriage had ended, I was continuing my extensive efforts to rebuild my life post-abuse disclosure and subsequent serious illness. I was dealing with the sudden terminal illness then death of the last person I had left who could be termed a ‘loved one’. I was studying, volunteering, making plans for self employment to revive the hard won and much beloved career stolen by the effects of abuse … and a whole lot more. Then after a final piece of devastating news it all stopped.The words straw and camel come to mind. I saw no light this summer. I stopped going out and my world closed down. Suicidal thoughts raged aplenty.

Now in dire straits financially, as a result of my marriage ending, and illness, I need Jack’s recipes all the more. My grocery shopping of late has almost entirely comprised products from the supermarket’s ‘basic range’, thanks to Jack encouraging me to try more than one or two. I’ve found I didn’t have enough money to buy tampons and put back food items to pay for them. Now I no longer have money to shop. Last week I was referred to a local food bank – a surreal moment and one that I’m still finding difficult to process. My first food parcel will arrive on Thursday.

My new found cooking confidence is helping to sustain me in more ways than one at this terribly difficult time. I’m sure I’ve cooked more in recent weeks than in the rest of my adult life and I’m using cooking implements that have long languished in boredom. I have a history of mental illness because of the trauma and abuse I have experienced. Reactive depression has returned with a vengeance, that alone makes me feel like I’m wading through treacle. It feels good to know that I am sustaining myself with good home cooked food. A bit of weighing, chopping and stirring goes some way to distracting my troubled mind.

I fear turning on lights and as colder days approach, I know that I can no longer afford to heat my home, despite the fact that the cold exacerbates my chronic pain. At risk of homelessness, I know that without a roof over my head, cooking will be the least of my worries. I hope there is a way I can be supported to stay in the one-bed rented flat I found last year and have grown to love so much, and keep on cooking and growing.

Thank you Jack for your brilliant recipes delivered in a gentle easy manner that means even the most ‘culinarily-challenged’ like me can be engaged.

I thought there could be no greater surprise than when I took up running last year (I am far from an athlete) but now … now I find I’ve added the category Food and Cooking to my blog :))) !

I still can’t make an omelette, despite Jack’s gentle instruction I still end up with scrambled egg. One day  …

With love and many grateful thanks to you Jack xx

*Thanks also to Jack for the introduction to the Hive, buy books online and support vital independent booksellers at the same time. Click here to buy any of Jack’s books – no, I’m not on commission 😉 !