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January to March 2003
Being the start of a New Year it was quiet at work and after Christmas there
was the usual anti-climax. Things at work were OK but there was still a
negativity. Also the office had divided into a ‘them’ and ‘us’ situation
which was not a nice atmosphere to work in. Also during this time the war in Iraq
happened which changed the priorities at work.
April 2003
My company had announced a move to a new location which meant a drive of 20
miles up the M1. Now I had a phobia to driving on motorways which was a
legacy from my previous bout of depression. So I saw my GP to see if I could get any help to overcome
it and he put me in touch with
a Cognitive Behavioural Therapist whom I started seeing mid April time. I
started keeping a journal of my therapy sessions which, on reading again, hold
some of the clues to my spiral into depression.
I am beginning to have very emotional days. I write that I miss my friend
who died in 1997 and still haven’t got over her death – couldn’t quite let
her go. I also have references to feeling drained and I am obviously not
sleeping well as there are references to very emotional nights, sometimes
all night long, succumbing to a glass of whiskey to help me sleep.
By mid April I am referring to work problems and tensions at home. At this
time I am also studying hard for my Psychology A level so weekends are taken
up with study, reading and writing. I also refer to work as ‘daunting’
April entries also refer to me finding it hard to feel motivated and the
atmosphere at work is dreadful. But despite this I begin to stay late at work,
coming home very tired. There are a lot of references to feeling drained and
can’t be bothered. I also refer to being fed up of struggling. Work is manic
and the days seem to drag. Lots of bad sleepless nights as well.
By the end of April I am using terms such as feeling drugged, no energy,
sleeping on and off during the day if I have a day off work.
May 2003
At the beginning of May I find an entry which suggests this is the start of
the ‘blaming’ side to depression. It’s all everybody else’s fault that I
feel like this. I am also hitting the wine more frequently in order to help
me sleep. I am also experiencing frequent headaches and anxiety.
By mid May we have a breakthrough in therapy and find a common link between
childhood car journeys and motorway driving being the trigger into past
fretful experiences in a car. I confess that during my driving practices I
discover I have three people driving with me: An imp (which is my
mischievous side coming out) and which goads me to go onto the motorway; A
bossy person (I shan’t name them but it is a family member) who sits at the
back of my head telling me to ignore the Imp, a friend telling me I am doing
OK, and my own inner voice trying to keep all the others quiet! But, in some
respects this liberates me and I jump a huge step forward.
The therapy sessions during May and June, although helping me to overcome my
driving phobia, actually start to unleash a lot of hidden resentments and
suppressions in my life. So although I have addressed one area of my
anxiety, it is actually starting up other anxieties.
June/July 2003
I think this is the beginning of the Yo-Yo effect that depression starts from.
Although I refer in my journal to feeling calmer and happier, these are all
feelings towards my phobia. We have discovered that I am in fact agoraphobic
and not claustrophobic as I at first thought. I find out that agoraphobia is a
fear of leaving a place of safety. So, once I leave my safety zone, the anxiety
rises and I feel out of control and am then inclined to have panic attacks.
By realising this I actually feel much better that there is a reason for me
feeling out of control.
In mid June my son and his girlfriend return from university to live with
us. This is the beginning of changes to lives – his as well as ours. Up
until now, my husband, daughter and me have got into a pattern of life. Our
son’s room became a sort of store room and we had turned it into a
computer/study room. Suddenly peace was shattered. With two extra people in
our tiny house and only one bathroom and toilet, tempers begin to fly. There
is a lot of tension between us all. No-one is really happy and all of us
begin to suffer our losses: ours as we had no privacy; theirs because they
were used to being away from home and were students, and our daughter’s
meant she got disturbed by all the shouting and tension.
From June onwards, the workplace is manic. There seems to be so many things
to have to do all at once and policies and procedures changed by the minute.
No-one at work is happy. There is a lot of whispering and the division
between workmates was apparent. I hated the atmosphere and began to think it
was my fault and that I should do more to help.
After each therapy session I would feel great about things and very
positive, but when I returned to the negative tension at work and the
negative tension at home, my positive side starts to wane. I am very
sensitive to atmosphere and find it very difficult to cope in negative
places. Everyone is so negative at work; some have started to lose the will
to carry on and people are beginning to not be bothered. There is much loud
shouting, tempers flying, sniping and general misery at work. At home it is
not much better so from the end of June onwards I begin to try and keep
everything going. But it is too much.
With terrible sleepless nights, the hot weather, the nastiness at work and
the stress and tension at home, I am finding it difficult to cope. I start
to stay late at work as going home seemed a worse place to be.
I start getting bad migraines and headaches. I feel tired, de-motivated and
isolated. Communication is breaking down everywhere and I just want to find
some peace and quiet.
August 2003 – October 2003
At around August through to end of October I start to realise that my job is
eroding away. A lot of the things I was responsible for had been taken
out of my hands and was now done by a corporate body. I begin to feel
unwanted and undervalued.
During this time people in the office were coming to speak to me to offload
a lot of their frustrations with the workplace. Being n the privileged
position of administrator, I got to hear the whinges, whines, moans and
groans from all sides, so in fact got a global picture of the whole
problems at work. This was to take its toll though as I had no-one I could
offload my feelings to. Admittedly I had allowed myself to be used as a free
counsellor, but I did not know how to handle the situation. I kept getting
hauled into situations that I really did not want to be in.
I began to feel melancholy at work and felt invisible to some people. This
affected my character and I started to lose my cheerful, bubbly character. I
also began to look upon myself as a failure. I hated the workplace yet the
thought of finding another job was daunting. I felt very rejected as well
and this could come about over silly things. I really need to talk when I am
depressed, yet friends and family are not always the best people to talk to.
It is vital therefore that I am taken seriously and accepted for what I am.
Offloading inner bizarre thoughts onto someone is very important to me.
So I begin to drop subtle hints which a counsellor or therapist would pick
up on, but non-trained people such as friends or family will try to solve
the problem, or they may back away. But the worst for me is people, through
fear or feeling awkward, may turn things around and start to interrupt or
make a joke and that is when I really feel rejected. If this happens I will
begin to retreat into myself and don't bother speaking to anyone as I fear
they will laugh at me or make fun. so I start to act the part - put on the
mask. Bubbly character on the outside but very unconfident and low on the
inside.
September 2003
It was around this time that I had contemplated a change of career and
thought of Counselling. I believed I would be good at it. So I started on a
course for basic counselling skills. I felt cheated when I found out how
long it would take to accomplish being a counsellor and as money as the
stumbling block, it was a non-starter. But the worst thing that happened was
I began to unravel a lot of resentments of the past and this frightened me.
During role play I seemed to be the client on most occasions and started
pouring out pent up frustrations to complete strangers. This led to a
paranoia that I was unburdening resentments about people who were still
alive - what if they found out? So then I would feel guilty.
By October time, most of the members of the department have either given up
or were angry over issues happening in the work place. I resented having to
work in such as awful atmosphere so I started to take days off work, waking
up crying and feeling emotional. Thankfully I have a very sympathetic boss.
I must not forget also that this time things at home were getting worse and
my husband's and my relationship was beginning to be affected. We could no
longer enjoy the privacy of our house - there always seemed to be someone
around. We were both missing a vital part of our relationship in the sensual
side of things. Also, we were very much living in the past and trying to
rectify all the wrongs our parents had put upon us. We both felt cheated in
a lot of respects; angry, frustrated, fed up and not knowing which way to
go. My husband had the threat of redundancy hanging over his head and our
financial situation was fragile. We always seem to be crises led where money
is concerned
I was feeling trapped, lonely, alone and miserable with a heavy dread
hanging over my head. I started taking my work problems back home and would
spend most of the weekend talking about work and how bad things were. I
started blaming myself for a lot of the problems and felt that as I couldn't
cope, there must be something wrong with me.
I began to feel very angry at work and home. there was no let up. I just
wanted some time to myself and peace. There was nowhere to relax and the
problems at home were making me angry. I had a terrible anxiety and angst
most of the time. I dreaded going into work and dreaded going back home. I
just wanted to run away and be on my own and left alone.
November 2003
Things had really deteriorated by now. We had an office move coming up,
Christmas was not far away and the tempers and frustrations at work were
horrendous – I just couldn’t cope. I desperately wanted some space to
myself; I needed time to think; I was very negative about work and home and
really found myself on this never ending wheel of taking work to home and
home to work – there was no let up. I was also very tired – exhausted in
fact – and the melancholy and tears were now engulfing me. I cried a lot at
work, lost my temper, became a very angry person. I hated myself. I was not
a nice person. I didn’t want to look in the mirror – I felt ugly. My body
seemed to weigh a ton and I stopped wearing make up. I hated anyone near me
and shrugged my family off if they came near and this is a crucial symptom
to my depression. Depression is being totally wrapped up in oneself – quite
selfish really, but there is also the martyr side to it - one carries on
regardless, sinking deeper and deeper into a never ending spiral of
melancholy, anxiety and a terrible isolation from the rest of the world but
somehow trying to prove to oneself and others that you really are a hero
coping with all these problems and still carrying on.
By the of end November/beginning December I was now almost out of control. The
weeping and crying was getting worse – I was now crying openly at work. I
felt confused, frustrated and unable to talk in case I cried. I just felt so
lonely, alone and dejected and locked in a prison-like well. There were
windows in my cell which I could see through but couldn’t quite unlock. But,
in fact I didn’t want to unlock any of them as it meant coping with
something new.
I finally wrote on my self certificate form at work the word stress. That
was it – occupational health called me over for a chat and I just broke down
there and then.
December 2003
We had gone out for a meal two weeks before Christmas. I was exhausted but
went along. When the next day my colleague said that her partner thought I
looked very ill, I decided that I would try and get a week off to think and
get my head around Christmas. I presented myself to my doctor and just cried
and cried in the surgery – I couldn’t stop the tears – He had said what I
wanted to hear – I was depressed. Then, and only then, could I accept it.
From then on I could either retreat further into oblivion, or take the
anti-depressants and start climbing upwards again. I chose the latter.
So, in answer to my question – why did I go into depression again? Well I
suppose it was a culmination of everything. We all have a breaking point;
some people are lucky and never go into depression – they seem to be able to
cope with all life’s miseries. Others suffer very badly.
I think I suffer when I can’t make a structure out of things that happen to
me. I am a very organised person, very chatty, love people and enjoy
people’s company. Only when I am threatened with too many problems all at
once does my guard and mask begin to crumble. If I cannot get back into my
safety zone again, I will feel threatened and vulnerable. If the threats,
pressures and stress are not allowed to be addressed by me in my own way,
then I will go under and start drowning.
2003 was a very hectic, manic year. So many things happened which were
beyond my control, and those, together with the tasks I had put upon myself
to do (A level, counselling etc) I just overdid it and succumbed to
depression.
But the year does have some happy times.
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I did
overcome my fear of driving and have now managed to get to work and back
using the M1 on my own.
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We did sort out the tension and stress at home (we are all working to rules
and regulations that everyone is happy with
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My boss and I have
sat down and discussed my job role and changed things so that I have got
something I can own
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We have moved
offices and people have left the department and new people have come in
which has changed the atmosphere
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I got a C pass for my Psychology A level
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I did complete the counsellors’ course
and passed
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I have stopped doing overtime at work and do take a lunch break
But the best thing that happened to me in all of this is that I had time to
paint. In the 12 weeks I was off work I painted a visual diary and this has
been very successful. I had no idea how powerful these paintings were to the
medical profession, students, friends and relatives. Most people have
regarded my diary as something of value to them. It has given the
non-depressed an insight as to how depression evolves. To the depressed,
they have identified similar feelings and thoughts.
My paintings have given me a freedom; they have liberated my artwork and I
have begun to explore an inner feeling of allowing myself to think freely
and paint what I see.
I had a rough time being depressed but I am now looking to a future whereby I can
paint without the restrictions I put upon myself and to express my feelings
in a colourful way. I have decided to call my visual diary Depression
Expression. Please visit the pictures and see for yourself what I went
through.
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