Grief and loss are different

Grief is something I honestly believed I had experienced in my life. Something I believe was hard to get through but got better with time. I am learning that although in the past I have experienced loss, I have never truly grieved. I have never experienced the roller-coaster of emotions that go along with the loss of a loved one. While I'd lost people throughout my life, they'd never been people I saw regularly or was exactly close to and although losing them hurt, it wasn't really grief in its truest sense. Now I have learnt the meaning of grief and it feels like with time it only gets harder.

Losing someone you are close to and talk to nearly every day is hard to come to terms with. How can it be they are no longer here? How can I just never speak to them again? It seems to make no sense. Although death is part of life, and something we all experience, when it happens to someone close to you, the logic goes out of the window and suddenly it is incomprehensible that this could happen.

Recently I lost someone that I was extremely close to and I never realised how much they meant to me, until I could no longer talk with them. I depended on this person in ways I never knew. I felt safe, because I knew that no matter what they would always be there for me, that was just the type of person they were. Suddenly losing that has bought with it a whole host of emotions that I have never really experienced in this way before.

For example today I was walking into a building with my mum and I was talking about keys, and I said that many people found it strange that I had my mum and dads house keys and then went on to say that people also found it strange that I had, this persons house keys. This for some reason bought me to the point of tears. I was just standing there trying my hardest to hold back the tears. Yet other times I can talk about this person and not cry a single tear. The longer since the loss, the harder that seems to be.

You see when you first lose someone, I think in the back of your mine, subconsciously you don't really believe they are gone, it's like it isn't real. Like it never happened in the first place. You've been to the funeral, you've said your goodbye's but it still doesn't seem in any way real. You still expect to be able to pop round and see them, have a chat with them. Tell them what's going on. For a while I think it is easier to just feel as though they're not available. The longer since they have passed though, the harder that gets. You start to realise there is nothing you can do, you will never be able to talk to them ever again. Never be able to tell them about your achievements, see them laugh, nothing and that's when it becomes hard to take.

When you do something positive, it becomes bitter sweet because you feel good that you have done this positive thing but you want to tell this person and you can't. So suddenly you're crying again. Other times you just feel generally happy. As though everything is okay, then something small will remind you of them an you begin to feel angry at yourself for smiling and being able to go on, even though they're not here. Then you start to feel guilty because you know that's not what they would have wanted. They of course would want you to be happy. Being happy in a time of grief will always be bitter sweet though.

I have found that I can go from looking at a picture of a sweet (not even one this person has ever mentioned in the time I have known them) to thinking about how much you miss them, in just a few short thoughts. It is like everything you do reminds you of them and sometimes you wish it would stop. Sometimes you don't want to be reminded all the time but then you feel once again guilty, because how can you not want to be reminded of someone you loved?

Grief and loss are most definitely two different things. I can say without a doubt this is the first time I have ever truly grieved. I miss this person every day and I would do anything to bring them back. I will always remember them and I know life has to go on. Sometimes though, it just feels wrong for life to go on as normal when someone that was so important to me is no longer here.

The new benefits system and mental healh treatment

There are many things in this blog post that I am not happy to be sharing but I feel strongly that people need to tell their stories about what the benefits system is really doing to people. So I have decided to ignore everything in me that is telling me not to post this, and post it anyway. I believe that keeping quiet is only giving this government more power and I no longer wish to allow this government to continuously tell lies about what they are setting out to do with the benefits system-so here is my story-please do not judge me too harshly lol

 This has resulted in me claiming ESA and DLA. I finished a degree in Psychology and counselling in May last year and gave myself a year to recover from the mental health issues I have had for ten years now. I wanted to get better, get a job and save to do my masters, so that I could eventually become a counsellor and help people in my situation.

The problem I have found with this is two fold. First is actually getting treatment to suit me. The only treatment that seems to be available on the NHS is CBT-which I have previously had to no avail and medication, which the side affects of are always too much for me to get through. I have found that I am now blamed for my illness and viewed as someone that "doen't want help" which is incorrect. I do want help and I do want treatment, I just want a treatment that suits me. Any mental health professional knows that no one form of therapy suits every single person. Yet this is no longer coming across. CBT is cheap and fast and therefore the only form of therapy that I seem to be able to get. While the figures for the success rate of CBT may look impressive at first glance-at around 49%-this still leaves 51% of people that make no improvement throughout CBT treatment. So I fail to understand how this can possibly be seen as a treatment that helps all.

Further to this on follow up studies a year after treatment the success rate fell to 39% and two years are this fell to 18% of people successfully helped through CBT-it also found that during this period some paitients had received further treatment. Also the majority of the 18% were the ones that scored at the bottom end for meeting the criteria for an anxiety condition. Which suggests that for people with a more severe case of anxiety-such as myself-CBT is of absolutely no use. Yet this seems to be the treatment continuously pushed upon people. I myself have often felt hopeless as a result of CBT not working as so many professionals will tell you the only time it doesn't work is when you don't put the effort in-not really a good thing to say to people with mental health issues-especially when the failure rate is so high.

The second wall I find I face in my recovery is the constant badgering I get through the benefits system, to go for medicals, fill out medical forms to prove my illness. I am constantly found to be in the medium term and work can be considered in 6 months. This means that while 6 months sounds like a long time in reality this drops to 4 months before the whole process starts again.

I will receive a medical form 2 months before the date that my review needs to be done. I filled it out, sent it back (filling out the form on its own is extremely stressful because you have to admit to yourself all the ways in which your illness affects your life-I have found this has made me a lot more depressed than normal).
I sent it back and had a very worrying two month wait until I heard anything. This sent my anxiety through the roof and I became extremely irrational. I lost friends during this period as I became paranoid and starting attacking people-verbally-that I care about. In the end I ended up at the hospital as my friend was worried that I would do something stupid. I had become suicidal at the time and the thought of taking my own life became very rational to me. After months of not self harming I began to self harm again.

I eventually received a letter to say I am in the work related activity group, which means the DWP consider me to be someone who is ready to work on returning to the work place. However they do not wish to give me any mental health support to get there. They make no allowances for my illness, I get an appointment for my meetings with my advisor at Cheshire training and I have no choice but to attend-despite the fact that I can have days when I am so anxious I find it impossible to get out of bed, let a lone out of the house! I cannot guarantee which days these will be and therefore I may be unable to attend on the day of my appointment, yet if this happens I get sanctioned.

I did a degree while ill and not only did I find it a lot less stressful and worrying but I found they were more accommodating to my illness. They made allowances because of my illness, I was under a lot less pressure there than I am now. To me this makes no sense. How can it be an academic setting is more supportive of an illness than the benefit system that s set up to support me during my time of illness?

The only way to describe what they are doing is it feels like they are poking you constantly saying "are you ready for work now?" "you need to get out to work" "you need tough love" "you should be at work by now" while at the same time giving me no suitable treatment for me, to get me there!

The way they are treating people like me is not likely to get anyone out to work, it is not tough love, there is no love involved in any of this. The compassion has gone out of this government and again the poor are being made to pay. I am one month off of my year deadline and I am a lot worse not better. This new system is not only, not helping me back into work, it is also guaranteeing that I will be unlikely to be well enough to return to work for a very very long time!

What is really the measure of success?

Why is it in this society success is often measured by the possessions we have? The money we make? Why is it not measured by how happy we are?

I want to do a job that won't exactly make me rich but it will make a difference in a few people's lives. That will make me happy. Knowing that for someone, their life will be changed for the better, due to the work I do. Yet because it won't make me loads of money, I will not be seen as a success?

When I was growing up, we weren't rich, we had very little money to our name. This made people look down on us. Made people think "I wouldn't want to be like them" the thing is though, my parents are kind, loving, loyal people, who will help those they care about. To me that is success. The fact that they are good people who have people in their lives who they are about, is more important than the brand of the clothes on their backs.

I want to be someone who will always be there for others. Who will always aim for happiness over money. Of course we all need money to survive. All I want to be able to do though, if live comfortably. Be able to pay my bills, buy new clothes every now and again. Basically not have to really struggle for money. If I can get that, I will be happy.

I believe success should be measured by happiness. Money is something that we earn, something that gives us the ability to feed our families, pay our bills and go on a holiday once or maybe twice a year. Happiness is the thing that makes our life complete and for some people happiness can only come with money.

I challenge you though, if you believe happiness can only come with money, look around at all the people in your life, the animals, the every day things that make you smile and ask yourself, would you give it all up to be rich? I know I won't!

Finding me

So I have found out, there are people I have never ever met in my entire life who search my username online and look at all the things I  have done under that user name, simply because I disagree with them online. This seems very odd to me. I don't like them one bit, I haven't spoken with most of them in a while though, it appears they seem to have some sort of obsession with me. I do not understand this.

If people can become this obsessed with someone they have never met, that is alarming. It is not like I am famous or anything. I am just a person who does not agree with them. They are probably reading this, getting wound up, that they cannot respond. Why though? What is the point?

I know myself I have at times allowed myself to become very involved in these arguments and allowed it to become personal, but contact with these people has now been cut. I have no contact with them. I am simply in a group that they are in but they never comment. Surely they should leave it alone now? The time should have come for them to move on from our arguments.

The funny thing is, they are not just obsessed with me. There is another member they also do not get on with and they seem to have a little obsession with her too. In fact I swear they think we have magical powers that means we control the internet.

They seem to believe I attention seek as I share things about my personal life online. Because I am NOT ashamed to have suffered with mental health issues. This does not make me an attention seeker. I do this online because I have the freedom to do so. In fact if you put my user name into google a lot of pages will come up with posts from me in different groups. These groups are for people with mental health issues such as my own. If they bothered to read it they would see though, that some of the posts are also comments on other peoples threads offering support. I do this because it does not come back and bite me in the arse in my real life. It is separate from my real life. People from me real life are not members in these groups and even though I have fallen out with people in my real life, none of them have felt the need to become so obsessed with me that they search my username and discuss what they found.

I honestly hope these people get help, seriously. They need to learn to let go. Neither myself nor Donna have any magical powers. We do not control the internet, I think I would have money for things like therapy and the such like if I had any control over the internet what so ever. I really do feel for them. I cannot imagine how hard it must be to become so obsessed with two people they have never met.

Inside my head

Inside my head I am a mess, feeling completely absorbed by stress. Like there is no escape.While outwardly I smile; laugh; say all the right things, inwardly I am screaming for someone to help me please. 

With no idea how to cope or even how to let go, I find I want to scream and cry and let this all out. Yet something inside my head is saying "no you cannot show that level of vulnerability", telling me I cannot cry, I cannot scream I cannot allow myself to be out of control. I cannot allow myself to let it flow out. 

Every day I wake up wondering whether this will ever change but surely there must be an answer? Something deep within. A reason I am like this, a reason it can be over come. How do I find this though? What do I do?

So many seem to think I make this out to be worse than it is, when they see me out and about they assume I must be fine. They do not see the struggle inside, the voice in my head screaming that I cannot do this. The adrenaline, telling me to run. The amount I have to push myself just to get out of the door. Sometimes I want to stop pushing myself so hard, I want to just let it be, but I know I cannot do that, as I do not want to end up a prisoner in my own flat. I have to push myself, I have to try and go out.

Some days I manage to control the fear, instead of the fear controlling me. I work hard to make sure no one can see that right in that moment I am having a panic attack. This does not mean I do not struggle, I do not fight and I simply just make it out worse than it is, it means I have become good at hiding what is reallly going on in my head at that moment in time.

Yet no matter how hard I try, how much I push myself, no matter what I do, I just cannot seem to get past this wall, that in there standing between me and getting better. I try to break it down, I try to keep on going, but still it stays knocking me back at every attempt.

I sometimes wonder how much more I can take? Whether I can continue to fight and to be. Yet I know I have to fight, I know I have to be. I want to live, just not with this pain and fear. I want to be free of it, I want to be okay.

I wish my life were a little simpler and not so hard to get through and just be.