Where the Dark Takes Me.

This is where the dark takes me.

To places where I begin to question whether motherhood is really something I can do. Where I start to fantasise about pills and escaping and curling up in a corner and never coming out.

Where life gets too much and all I can see is the pain I'm causing everyone around me. The frustration in their eyes that I'm 'still not better'. The anger when they recount to me that they are doing more than they are capable of to help me, everything that they know of to fix me. But that I'm not stepping up. I'm not responding. What more do I need?

But I don't love her any less.
I don't love him any less.
I still feel a heart glow when she smiles, and when she laughs.
I still try to make a clean house because I know that makes him happy.
I read her stories because I know that makes her happy.
I do my best and sometimes I manage to even look happy.

Sometimes I can laugh. Those are good days. Day's when I manage to do things. When I can get out of bed without thinking about how I am drowning.

I remember before she came along. How excited I was. How happy I imagined life would be.

But I was wrong. Perhaps I am not supposed to be a mother.

But that doesn't mean I regret her for even one instant. Because she is perfect. She is my light. But she is also my darkness and in the darkness I believe she deserves better than I can provide.

That is where the dark takes me.

Not Ok

I have to get out. I just don't know how.

I'm pretty sure that all I am learning in here is to be quiet. The less I tell them, the freerer I remain.
If I tell them I want to hurt myself, they'll post a 24/7 watch on my door.
Today I actually packed my entire room up and told them I wanted to be discharged. This was, admittedly through a haze of ugly crying. Just like that, talking to a doctor. More hospital protocol being lectured at me.

I can't stand it. I actually think I am becoming worse just being here.

There is an ever growing list of things I can and can't do. Don't use unsterilised water for your baby bottles. Don't enter the art room in only socks. Don't eat your meals in your room (granted, I haven't actually been caught on that one yet). Don't use a hot water bottle. Don't use a wheat bag. Don't use a heat pack. Don't try to escape.

Definitely, don't try to escape.

But I haven't felt normal in over a week now. I have felt dizzy and nauseas every one of those long days. A nurse suggested it was anxiety, but dizziness isn't one of my anxiety symptoms. I want to stop taking the respiridone. I don't think it's helping. My moods are swinging with more severity and to further extremes than they have ever done before. I can't sleep. I have no appetite. I was happy and feeling good within myself for twelve whole hours, from last night to lunchtime today.

I wrote 1000 words on my novel. I rang my sister. I wrote poetry. I went for a long walk in the sun with Bean and on the way we sang and I composed two songs in my head. Neither of which I can remember.

Our lovely walk - kind of. Source: www.christchurchtop10.co.nz

But all it took was for one nurse, to say one thing and I crashed so hard, that I still haven't got back up.

I am so tired. I was falling asleep by seven. But it's closer to ten now and here I am. Writing furiously because I actually don't feel safe.

There, the truth.

I don't feel safe with myself right now, and I am afraid to tell anyone because all I want to do is go home.

I am looking at my pinboard (which is now covered in pictures of trees and other nature things I ripped from magazines in the lounge) and desperately trying to imagine myself in a secluded cabin. With no one but myself for company, and nothing but a book to read and a novel to write. Two weeks of nothing but freedom and nature.

I think, that that is what would get me well.

This drug trial prison is going to kill me. But if I say anything like that, the walls will only close tighter.

Ward Meeting and Real Estate Menus

This morning was my first ‘ward meeting’, and I had been warned about it, but clearly was still unprepared.

Ten people, a registrar, two medical students, two house doctors, my nurse, a social worker, all sitting with folders and staring at me and my little family as I’m forced to discuss my week, my thoughts, and disclose all the many side effects I am experiencing from this apparent drug trial I am on.

Nausea, fatigue, fogginess, forgetfulness, dizziness, diarrhea, re-lactation – relactation? Really? Cue blood test. Waiting. Probable medication change. Start again.

Afterwards I am so overwhelmed that I start to cry and feel the all-to-familiar darkness coming back for another go.

We take Bean to the park, and put her in the swings and go down the slide. Her funny half giggles, the fresh autumn air and the cool sunlight push the black away, just for a little while.

I’ve decided that whoever writes the menus here (which we must mark off a week in advance), must be a former real estate agent. Hired to transform soggy food into fresh, vibrant ideas, so that we are fooled into believing we actually have a choice.

Yesterday, I chose ‘Satay Chicken on a bed of rice with seasonal vegetables’. I received a plate of white meat, in an equally pale sauce, speckled with red flakes and a slightly orange tinge. It tasted how it looked, there was definitely no satay. The seasonal vegetables are apparently code for frozen mixed veges and suspiciously phallic kumara.

I’ve only wanted to kill myself twice today.

All The Little Pieces Falling Out Of Place

Two nights ago, I was "the new one." The "where is the new one's dinner tray?" The "why are you here, are you from Christchurch, how old is your baby?" The New One.

Because two nights ago, just hours after my last blog, I was sitting in my therapists office, sobbing uncontrollably, unable to stop my nails from digging deeper into my arms, begging her to put me in hospital.

And here I am.

"This ward is sad. I'm sure people will think I'm a snob becuase I've shut muself away in my room. It's hard to make something so sterile and dated look - let alone feel -  homely. But I'm really trying.
Maybe that's the point, so you don't want to stay here? Amongst the word down carpet, the scratched and dented walls, or the old fashioned cots, some steel some flakey paint white.
They've decorated the walls with Winnie The Pooh Decals, but somehow that just seems to exacerbate the overall sense of despair." 07.04.14

It was an unexpected ending to a very planned out day, ending up here. An inpatient in a mental health ward. I actually couldn't tell you how it happened. Except that it did.

I was home from respite. I was excited to be there. I was loving Bean lots. I was excited about all the changes to our lifestyle we were starting to make. We were going to eat healthier, have screen free bedrooms, hire a cleaner once a week, get some help with Bean by hiring a Nanny or finding some daycare.

Everything was going to be all right.


The next morning I woke up with a masterpiece in my head. A book on par with the Da Vinci Code. It was going to be the book of the year. A thriller to defy all thrillers to date. It was going to be a movie within six months of its (imminent) release. I was going to win a Pulitzer. An Oscar. And of course, Ellen was going to star in it.

I couldn't wait to get writing. I wasn't exactly sure what I was writing, but I had a killer opening sentence and a fairly-solid-almost-completish idea for the story itself. But first, I had to write a blog. I needed to reassure everyone that I was ok after my weekend of melancholy poetry uploads. I also had to attend my stroller fitness class because I'd booked and paid for it. Besides, fitness is good for your mental well-being, it gives you endorphins, it makes you happy. And wasn't happy my goal?

I only lasted 20 minutes into the session.
I couldn't keep up with the other mums. I suddenly realised how tired I was. I suddenly found myself biting back tears.

That was all the warning I had, before my happy morning clouded over so fast, that I didn't have time to catch it.

I've been here three days now. My moods are cycling so rapidly I can barely catch a breath. I thought I'd be super visual with y'all and draw a diagram so you can understand a bit better.

This graph is not an exaggeration I'm sorry to say. It really is that fast, and the moods really are that extreme.

Since this time last week I have had my medications played round with in ways I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. I've had increases in Lorazepam (Ativan). "Take half a tablet. Try two. Oh, lets just say 3mg shall we, feel better yet?" 

I've had decreases in Fluoxetine (Prozac) "Been on it seven years, you say? Well, clearly it's not working. Let's stop it now shall we?"

I've flirted with Quetiapine(Seroquel). "12.5mg not putting you to sleep? Ok, take 25mg. Still not working? ok, 75mg. You were awake till 2am with restless crawling arms and legs? Ok, lets try 150mg. Oh wait - you seem to be reacting badly let's take you off it."  Thanks.

Started Sertraline (Zoloft). "Just a little at first, to counteract the withdrawals from the Fluoxetine, then we will increase it as needed."

Started Risperidone. "Now, this is similar to Quetiapine, but not the same. It is an antipsychotic, but no one is saying your psychotic. You're definitely not psychotic. 1mg?or half? Let's try half."

I've been experimental with Zopiclone. Half a tablet, one tablet, two tablets. Addicted. Try sleeping without it NOW HAHAHAHA.

It's no wonder I am a sleepless, scratching, nauseated, anxiety ridden, suicidal, elevated mess.

At least I managed to convince my charge nurse to include watching Ellen as part of my treatment plan. (My distress over the no TV before 5pm rule was not healthy).

I worry so much about the impact on Bean. 

I try to get someone else to take her if I'm about to start crying or if I am thinking of killing myself. But at the same time I worry that she is scared, I worry that she doesn't know where she is, that perhaps she is worried about me.

I worry that I don't know when this will get better or if this time I will even make it through. 

It is hard to keep going when you don't know where the light at the end of the tunnel is. 

It's hard to trust others and forgive myself when pieces of me are falling away and I am supposed to be the one person Bean can rely on.