Pissed Off and Fed up

I can't take this anymore, it's driving me mad. And everyone thinks it's my fault

And I hate revision.

I wish I would just disappear

Non mi piace l'italiano

Scrivo in l'italiano perche devo studiare per i essami. Non mi piace studiare l'italion e mi piacerrebe studiare il tedesco o solo la storia. Credo che l'italiano sia piu dificile di inglese. Sono stupido.

I am going to fail my exam. I am pancking immensely right now. Perche studiare l'italiano? Il tedesco e piu facile! I can't even put the accents in on here!

Grrrrrrrrr

Empty

I'm really struggling today. I need to pour my heart out but I do not have the right means to write at the moment.

Argh, this isn't helping.

I know I'm a hyperchondriac

...but I'm pretty certain it's not normal to be tachychardic on a regular basis. I'm actually beginning to get quite worried about my pulse rate, which is consistently above 100 and often closer to 120 bpm. Combined with my slightly lower than average blood pressure, and it doesn't quite seem normal.

So I googled the symptoms, which, as any hyperchondriac will tell you, is a very stupid thing to do. To be honest, that particular research experiment didn't cause too many worries, since the high pulse- low blood pressure combination can be practically anything. What it did do, however, was remind me of all the other little things that have felt vaguely abnormal in the last few months: the random lump in my neck, the strange palpitation-chest-pain-thing, the earchache that has never quite cleared up...the list goes on.

Sometimes, I wish I could just admit myself to hospital and have all the tests humanly possible. Maybe that would stop my underlying anxiousness. But then maybe that would anger the health service. It's a hard life fearing the power of your own body.

I just hope the pulse goes down.

Hierarchy

I have a problem with hierarchy.

I think that sums me up.

Musings

I'm in a rather penseive mood at the moment. As always, I seem to have drifted aimlessly to here with little sense of purpose other than to contemplate life. It sometimes bothers me that I only ever seem to right when I am upset or reflective; that every post implies negativity and doubt. Of all the blogs I have seen and read, only mine seems to dwell so much on my own thoughts, with so little acknowledgement of the wider world.

Sometimes, I think I should comment on the things that I am interested in. I often have very strong opinions and yet I never seem to voice them, even here. Perhaps I should comment on current affairs, politics or even the current economic climate. But then perhaps I should not. This has always been simply a place to write as things come to mind.

I did briefly contemplate starting a second blog in order to compensate for this need to comment on other things. I still can't decide whether that would be wise. Perhaps I will gradually feed more critique into this space; start to use this blog more constructively rather than a point of release for the tension that builds up inside me. This is not my space to rant, but a place of thoughts and feelings.

Writing this has calmed me down. I hadn't really realised that I was tense, but there was clearly something causing me subconscious discomfort. I feel another post coming on. I can feel topics inside me fighting to get out. Perhaps tonight I will post prolifically. Writing solves all ills.

A plea

I feel like there's nothing right about me anymore. All I ever seem to hear is the negative: what I shouldn't do, what I've done wrong, what I'm bad at.

Is there nothing good about me?

I'm rather pathetically addicted to you

It already feels a lifetime since I last saw you

I really miss you

x

Digestive difficulties...

Despite what some people may think, I generally don't complain that much about my digestive problems. Admittedly I am quite openly anxious when I don't have my medication, or if I eat certain foods but on the whole, I just accept that my stomach doesn't like food.

So when I start moaning about it now, it's because it's really, really bad. I hate having to sit next to the bathroom for hours waiting for it to pass, watching my stomach balloon and feeling sick. I hate that sometimes you just can't make it in time. And that it disrupts the whole day.

I just want to go home and instead I am sat outside the bathroom door. Typical.

You

I am sat opposite you, and I am happy.

I don't know what it is about your presence that seems to calm me down, but somehow you have always had this effect on me. Even when you barely knew me, you had this amazing capacity to make me feel safe and protected. Only a really special friend could ever do that.

You look really lovely when you are concentrating. You keep telling me that you are going to revise, but we both know you are reading blogs and forums on the things you actually enjoy. We both know this and we both don't mind; it makes me smile to know that you are happy and somehow you accept my half-hearted attempts to stear you back to work.

Sometimes, I like to just watch you. All those tiny little movements that you don't even realise you are doing fascinate me. I just want to wrap my arms around you and hold you tight, and never let you go. It's strange how much I want to protect you when it is you that makes me feel protected. You rescued me before Christmas, you kept me safe.

You still save me every day.

Ramblings...

Sometimes when I am tired, the only thing I find myself wanting to do is write. I don't have anything particular to write about, but short of anything better to do, I don't see the harm in just rambling to myself.

I sometimes wonder what someone might think if they read these thoughts and observations. Most of my posts have been written during periods of self doubt and anxiety; most of them show the sad side of me that has recently developed. It saddens me that that part of me has been able to dominate recently, and that I have lost a lot of how I used to be.

And somehow that has silenced me.

Losing interest

So it seems I have the attention span of a small insect. Having spent all day doing nothing, I've come home, checked my emails multiple times and so far avoided work. Or more specifically, I've opened the article I'm meant to be reading, stared at the page for a while and then decided that there are so many better things to do....

So I've ultimately retreated to this blog. And sat here with my cup of tea and my reflective mood, it's suddenly dawned on me that I hae increasingly lost interest in a lot of things recently. I used to work extremely hard, reading for hours on end and actually taken some enjoyment out of it and yet now, it's a small miracle if I can manage to read a ten page article in under an hour without resorting to just random doodles.

But it's not just my work that seems to have suffered as I have grown older, it's a lot of my other hobbies too. At one point, I practised three instruments and played in an Orchestra, I acted as stage manager twice a year and studied Spanish and Esperanto in my spare time. Now, it's a mircale if I actually achieve anything in my day other than the required actions of getting up, eating, attending a few lectures and ultimately going back to bed.

Perhaps it's an age thing; perhaps we lose our capacity to manage so many different activities as we grow older. Or maybe we have more responsibilities that prevent us from engaging in something we enjoy. In my case, I think it's more that I am out of habit. I have spent so long in a dark place that does not permit "fun" that I know longer know how to have it. Maybe I can change that again.

Stupidity

Sometimes I really do wonder what is wrong with people. A friend of my Oma once said that all people should be sterilised at birth, since our stupidity has created a world that isn't right for something so innocent as a baby.

People are so very stupid.

And what is more, I am fed up of people telling me I am wrong when they don't come up with any solutions themselves. I'm not always wrong!!!!

Sometimes I wonder whether it is sadness or anger that I feel the most.

Giving In

I just can't win.

I said I would do it; no one else volunteered. Now it's being taken over. This is happening and that is happening and it doesn't matter what I think anymore because the alternative has already been decided on. This was MY thing and now it's not.

But I am wrong to get upset by this; I am bad for being upset that my thing has been taken away from me.

I just don't get what I'm meant to do. So I give in.

Frustration

I find life unbelievably frustrating. Another day slips away and I have acheived nothing and have not enjoyed anything either. I spend so much time alone, I don't know how to have fun anymore.

And it's frustrating, because there's lots of things I would like to do, I just have no one to do them with. I want to go to Wroclaw and see the place my Grandma was born; I want to see the place of her childhood and I want to feel connected to her again. I really wish she had been buried. I keep trying to talk to her but I can't find her in the pool of thoughts and fears. I want to feel that connection again. And yet there's no one to go with, there is no one that can understand the significance of a place that has meaning only the context of a relationship I no longer have. Why would anyone else want to roam the streets where my Grandma once laughed and played?

I also want to go to Aushwitz. Going to a concentration camp is something that I believe is a fundamental part of modern life. I don't think anyone can even begin to understand the war until they have stood in a gas chamber and felt the feeling. I've been to Dachau and I was humbled. I want to go to Aushwitz because I want to share a part of that pain. No one else seems to get that. I think when you are German, or part German, there's this inherent sense of guilt that makes it all the more important to see it for yourself. Not everyone feels like that.

To be honest, I just need to get out of here. I need to feel that rush that travel brings. I've wanted to go inter-railing since I was fifteen, but I've never had enough friends, or even a single friend that could or would come with me. And deep down, my desire to go is stronger than my desire for companionship on the way. I want to see the world and experience it, and I'm quite happy to do that alone if no one else will come with me. I hate that this world is not safe enough for me to just wander the world on my own.

I don't even just want to travel abroad. I actually really love history and yet I rarely get to actually explore my interest. I live right next to a major castle, and yet I have never been because all my friends went without me, and no one else is interested enough. I live within easy reach of Stratford, and yet I've never been to the theatre there, or to any of the Shakespeare properties. It's such a waste. And yet it's so hard to enjoy these things alone; the one thing I always seem to be at the moment.

I'm so frustrated with life. Sometimes I really struggle to see the point of it at all.

Hyperventilating...

Tears

I just want to cry.

That is all.

vCJD

I am developing an unnatural obsession with vCJD. I think part of it is just morbid fascination and a genuine interest in prions, but largely it just horrifies me that I could be harbouring a disease that there is no cure for.

I guess in a lot of ways it's very similar to my fear of HIV. I'm petrified of having something that isn't fixible, of my own body attacking itself. And the even more terrifying thing about vCJD is that it can reduce you to a vegetive state within months, leaving you paralysed and mute. Just writing about this is raising my pulse rate.

I know there's no point being scared of something you can't control, but I live in constant fear of something like this happening. It's times like this when I wish I was a vegetarian.

Reminder

Reading other blogs about hypochondria does NOT help

But it does make me smile

Counselling

I've turned full circle.

When I first started counselling, I was too afraid to have individual sessions. There's something very frightening about sitting in a room with a stranger talking about your innermost fears and emotions; it's so unnatural to allow someone you don't know to enter into something so private. There's also something very clinical about counselling: the waiting with strangers and the recognitition that you are imposing on their very private problems, the little rooms with artificially laid out seating patterns that are meant to be friendly, the taking of notes as you speak....

Email counselling is very different. There's no invasion of privacy - just me, my laptop and the words. I always found email counselling very theraputic; the process of purging my emotions was enough to help me through the week, to last that little bit longer. Knowing that someone is going to reply feels like an annonymous acceptance - someone out there sympathises and agrees.

It was so hard to admit I needed more help. Once it became clear that email counselling wasn't doing enough to help, it felt like the only choice was 'real' counselling. Even then I didn't give in lightly. I did everything else first. Sitting there and telling your doctor that you think you are crazy is somehow one step easier than talking to a stranger. But somehow I found the courage to go, and for a while, it helped. Once I'd hit rock bottom, it was the turning point I needed and I did start to recover.

So I stopped. I thought I was ready to stand on my own two feet. I thought I had already made that new beginning that I needed. And I was wrong, so spectacularly wrong. My hands are blistered, my breathing too rapid and my eyes once again too used to tears.

And now I've admitted defeat, and I'm starting again. I await an email from my new counsellor.

Trusting Yourself

I used to believe that I could trust my first impressions, but recently I have begun to question even the most basic assumptions. People I used to trust wholeheartedly have proven to not to be friends, while people I have previously judged have shown a completely different side to themselves.

I feel like I am becomming more self aware. For the first time in my life, I am able to recognise that many of my immediate thoughts are overly critical or pessimistic and this has left me somewhat more confused. Part of me feels that I should trust my initial instincts but another, newer part of me is aware that in doing so I am often someone that I don't like.

It can be a bitter circle of self hatred. I have been told so many times that my thoughts are overly negative and the more I become conscious of this, the more I hate the way that mind works, and the more I begin to believe these comments. Sometimes, I am right to question myself; sometimes I do criticise unnecessarily and project this very negative view which understandably has the potential to offend people. But then at the same time, if events and thoughts are provoking such negative reactions and feelings within me, should I just ignore them and pretend to be happy?

Learning to trust and like myself again has been a huge part of my recovery from my depressive self, and I don't think I have quite achieved it yet. I know my instincts are often wrong and yet at the same time I feel a need to recognise that the things that I feel are valid, and are an important part of me.

For the record, I'm trying. I'm trying to be fair. I'm trying to be happy. I'm trying to be me.

Diagnostics

Having spent three hours in the waiting room at the walk-in centre yesterday, it was finally concluded that my boyfriend "probably doesn't have meningitis."

As far as my boyfriend is concerned, a 'probably' diagnosis is perfectly acceptable. While it may not be a certainity, he is convinced that it is nothing serious and is sufficiently reassured that the likelihood of it being so is very slim. For me, on the other hand, a 'probably' diagnosis is a clear admission of doubt and this hestitation alone is enough to make me worry further. Until the word 'probably' was slipped into the conversation, I was happy to assume that this was just a fever but now I am preparing myself for it to develop into something else.

This difference in attitude got me thinking...should the health service rule out the lesser options before it assumes the worse or is the opposite approach more effective?

I am not an expert on clinical diagnosis and indeed I have a very limited knowledge of how the health service actually works, but as far as I'm concerned, I would like to know that my doctor has categorically ruled out the worst before they diagnose something else. If I am presenting symptoms that could be some sort of throat infection but could also be mengitits, I'd much rather they confirmed it wasn't the latter before being dismissed.

As far as I'm aware, different countries take a different approach to diagnosis in this matter, and I am reliably informed that Spain, for example, will rule out the worst possible conclusion first. This makes a lot of sense to me. If I have little more than a throat infection, a few more days without medication won't do me much more harm, but if I actually have cancer, delaying treatment could be fatal.

The problem with my view, of course, is that this would cost the health service an absoute fortune but for me, as a complete hypochondriac, this approach would be far more reassuring. In an ideal world, every patient could be tested for the most serious diseases without fail, but I'll admit this is unlikely to ever happen.

In the mean time, while my boyfriend is happily taking his antibiotics, I'll sit beside and look after him and all the time hope that he will fine.

Him

I don't know how I feel about this. I should be writing this in my diary but I haven't got the energy to hold the pen. I don't have anything to say but the tears keep streaming and the faster I type the stronger I feel again. I just don't know what to do anymore and all I do know is that I can't stop caring; this is never going to stop bothering me.

He thinks that I still love him, but those feelings are long gone. I just miss my friend. More than anything else I hurt because my friend has rejected me and made it quite clear that they no longer care how I feel. And I still care, and I want him to be okay.

He makes me question everything. He makes me sit there for hours and hours questioning myself. Am I that person that he says I am?

I've lost sight of the answers

Untitled

Whenever I am happy, I don't get that desperate urge to write. It's not that I don't enjoy writing when everything in my life is going smoothly, but more that I find myself savouring the moment rather than needed to expell my feelings. When I read back through everything I have written over the years, the periods of happiness have tended to result in pages upon pages of trivialities and pointless observations. And part of me likes these entries just as much.

Even as I write this now, I don't have any particular purpose or aim. I'm not really trying to make any point or comment on anything particularly profound - I am just writing because I enjoy the process. My writing is the 'stream of consciousness' novel of my life; a completely purposeless insight into my mind.

But at the same time I do need to write when I am content; I need to record the moment and remind myself that sometimes life really is good. It's very easy to allow the negative thoughts to dominate and to write when things are hard to bear, but ultimately it's just as important to look back and see the good in life. When I do look back at all the things I have written, it is the silly little pointless peices that make me smile and have taught me the most about myself.

I don't think writing needs a purpose. I don't even think writing needs to make sense. For me, writing is not about entertaining or teaching or analysing but about learning and knowing more about oneself. Writing and reading are both the same; they are both about finding your own meaning.

Fighting back

Sometimes I get this feeling like everything is ending around me. The air somehow seems heavier and I find myself fighting to breathe. And the faster I breathe to try and stop the fear, the more I find myself losing control.

Sometimes I find myself scratching. Sometimes I do it deliberately because I need something to slow myself down; because the pain brings me back to reality. Sometimes I do it because I convince myself that I deserve the pain. I don't like doing it and yet it's like a cure, and I know that in allowing myself to inflict this pain I will find a release from the moment. Everytime I begin to panic I find myself looking at the scars and once again my mind fights with itself.

I don't know what brings me to do it but I know I should stop. And while I still get that urge to do it, I am fighting it. I am keeping my hands occupied. Making things, scribbling, baking, anything. Just holding a pen can sometimes be enough. I am fighting against the urge because I want to be me again.

And I am beginning to get better.

Note to Self

I've checked my emails at least ten times in two hours.

Perhaps I'm getting a little obsessive-compulsive.

Mortality

I spend a lot of time worrying about my health. I'm not entirely sure when I first became aware of my own mortality, but suffice to say I've been gripped with paranoia about disease and illness ever since.

What is interesting is that I am not particularly scared of pain. I don't spend hours awake at night worrying about the symptoms and effects of any particular illness, nor do I fear permanent disability. As much as I hate to admit it, it is the fear of death that consumes me.

Writing

My diary used to live safely under my bed. In my naivety I feared that someone might seek to read my thoughts and that somehow this dark place might keep my feelings secret. I flattered myself with the notion that my words might be of interest to someone else and at that same time feared that somehow this could be used against me. Writing was the cure to my constant state of worry and yet at the same time it fuelled it, leaving me paranoid that my private thoughts might be abused.

I have always had difficulty writing in front of people and even now, my diary remains completely private; my written mind and the rawness of those words are for me and me alone. Only two people have ever known any of the thoughts that it contains, and only one has ever been trusted to hold my words in their hands.

And yet I find myself writing here. Having spent so long hiding my thoughts away from the world, I have reached a point where my need to write surpasses my need for privacy. Some thoughts remain my own and demand the secrecy of my diary and yet some find themselves spilling out during the day. These words I am happy to share.

Words

Whenever I feel lost, I find myself again through words. I feel so much more alive when the words are flowing from my heart and my mind and I can think of nothing but the words themselves. I don't write with any purpose other than to release my emotion; the words don't need to make sense or have any particular meaning. That is the true beauty of writing - sometimes the very act itself is as significant as what is said.

I write because my mind is telling me to do so.

I write because I need release.