Hmm. I haven't even felt much like writing. I still don't now actually. it's like I have too many thoughts swimming around in the fish pond of my brain that I don't know which ones to write. 

In fact apart from a conversation about pink ninjas (so coloured so that they can blend against the wall of the pink house we walked past yesterday) I had with my boyfriend, it's all been a bit... bleh.

Gradually things at work got better over the week though.  Started with the Fool not really speaking to me, until by Friday, Manager took us both out for lunch, which was nice. 

My anxiety has been fairly stable too.  I hadn't really had any panicky moments at all, or even those niggly thoughts that keep the anxiety there simmering under the surface.  On the few occasions it did try to pop up, I sent it away again by breathing correctly and not thinking too much about it.  I have suddenly come to the realisation that at times when my chest starts to feel tight, or I'm getting that feeling of random fear, I do breathe far too quickly and too shallow.  So relaxing and taking deep breaths from my stomach, rather than my chest, is helping a lot.  And, I have my first psychology appointment on thursday.  So that should be interesting.

But then on wednesday my mum dropped the bombshell on me that she's feeling depressed again.

She has severe, chronic depression.  I remember the first time I found her, after her most serious suicide attempt.  We'd had an argument a couple of weeks earlier and I'd moved out to live with my boyfriend.  We patched things up but I didn't move back.  But I was still at college, and had exams coming up, and needed to study, so I'd asked if I could study at her place on a sunday afternoon.  She agreed.  But when I got there she didn't answer the door, and I didn't have any keys.  I remember eventually phoning her friend, and I don't remember why I did that, but she came round with her husband.  Then we phoned my grandparents friends, thinking they might have keys.  They didn't, but they came round to help.  In the end,
the two men went round to the back door and smashed a window to get in, then let us in the front.  I remember standing at the bottom of the stairs while they went up.  They wouldn't let me go up.  Then I heard them shout down to call an ambulance.  Obviously I ran up the stairs.  The two women tried to hold me back but they just held my coat so I shrugged out of it and kept going. 

I remember how my mum looked.  I thought she was dead.  Her eyes were half open, and there was dried white foam around her mouth.  I think at first, I thought she'd just been drinking, and had a fit (she's epileptic), because there was an empty cider bottle near the bed.  Then someone found the note.  I don't remember it very clearly.  Everything after that is a bit of a blur.  I remember someone taking me into the bathroom and sitting me on the edge of the bath while the paramedics came and dealt with my mum.  He wouldn't let me see the note but I made him tell me what it said.  She'd written to my brother saying not to think badly of his dad, that he still loved him.  And to me saying not to blame myself.  Obviously, I blamed myself.  I've never stopped.

Since then there have been too many suicide attempts to count.  I've not always been the one to find her, but a lot of times I have.  She was sectioned for a year in a mental health unit at the local hospital. 

Recently her depression's been better and they've sorted her medication.  And she's been so ill with her lung problems that I think she's been concentrating on getting better.  And now that's got a bit better, her depression's back.

Why I'm writing all this stuff, I don't know.

But I do know I had one of my first panic attacks around the time of her first suicide attempt.  At the time I blamed it on just starting the Pill, but maybe it wasn't.  I remember that I was laying in bed and thought I had a pain in my leg.  That led to me thinking I had a blood clot, and when the pain went, I inexplicably decided the clot was moving to my lungs.  Of course the chest pain I had then from the panic did not help matters.  I couldn't breathe, and my chest hurt, and I remember sitting up all night watching tv and thinking I should call an ambulance.  Then the next day I went to college, and I still had the chest pain, constantly.  I nearly passed out on the way to college, and when I got there my biology teacher saw how pale I looked and sent me home.  I went to the doctor who told me it was just a panic attack.  I just thought she wasn't taking me seriously.  The chest pains lasted a week until they eventually subsided.

Now there's also the business of my dad.  It's father's day today and I don't know what to do about it.  When I was 13 I decided to live with my mum, despite her alcohol problems she had at the time, instead of him, because of the emotional torment I suffered from his new wife.  He didn't speak to me again until I was 19.  No birthday card, christmas card, phonecall, nothing.  That was the original start of my emotional problems, maybe, because that was the time I started self-harming.  First the cuts on my hand, until my chemistry teacher noticed them.  Then I did them on my arm so I could hide them.  I remember having a lot of fights with my mum about it.  But I had a lot of supportive teachers at school that helped a lot.  I saw doctors and social workers and a child psychologist and in the end, just got better at hiding it. 

The thing is, I was always such a daddy's girl when I was a kid.  I remember when he used to go to work in the mornings, I would run to the front door as he closed it, and put his fingers back through the letter box, and I would hold them and not let him go.  I remember him being the one giving me pocket money and buying me presents.  My mum was just always there, of course, so I suppose I took her for granted.  But it did hit me hard when my dad just cut himself off from my life.  He wouldn't even answer the phone when I called his house, or his wife would answer and tell me to leave him alone.  He now blames her for his behaviour back then but I think that's a cop out.  He's now married to a much nicer lady who I get on with.  But the damage has been done and I find it hard to find love in me for him.  So I've never bothered with father's day.  I'll give him birthday and christmas cards, yes, but why celebrate father's day for someone who decided not to be my father for those years?  But then, how long before I can put it behind me and move on?  Can I be a hypocrite?  And not only that, but thinking about calling him was, I believe, one of the triggers for my last panic attack.

And then back to this week, and back to my mum...  She told me on the phone on thursday, when I was at work, that she was depressed again, and her cpn wanted to talk to me about some things.  I instantly went on the defensive and asked what things.  She said that it was because I haven't given her any rent money this month.  For a start, this was something we agreed on, because I had something else I needed to pay off this month.  And then I asked her, even if I gave her a million pounds, would it stop her being depressed?  Of course not.

But still when I got home the cpn lady was there.  And I freaked out, turned around and walked back out.  I went to the park and watched the ducks for a while, and then I went to my grandparents and talked to my grandad about his hernia operation.  By the time I got home, the cpn lady was gone.

I know I was probably wrong to do that but I'm not strong enough to handle these things at the moment.  I can't handle being told that if my mum wants to kill herself it's my fault.  Not that anyone says that directly but that is the implication I take from everything they say.

I think I've sorted things a bit with my mum now.  I've said I'll pay my share of the council tax this month and work something out for next month.  I stayed with Boyfriend this weekend and called mum last night and she said she felt ok but the crisis team took all her pills away. 

So I'm stuck here with all these thoughts and a loooong blog post which doesn't really even begin to cover it.  Good luck to my psychologist on thursday.  She's gonna need it.

V