- this is not an illness, this is a condition
This is the rest of my life.
Now I’m no psychiatrist* but I’m aware I’m in a pretty acute phase right now, not in crisis but still not quite stable so I’m still a little on the dramatic side but I don’t think I am catastrophising.
How do I know the difference between acute and crisis? Well when you’re in crisis you see people, not people, professionals. Everyone wants to check on you when you’re in a crisis, an acute phase means everyone watches and waits to see if you’re going to lurch back into a crisis or if you’re going to sort yourself out and find a way through.
Anyway, back to my original point.
I still think I’m going to wake up one day and be cured and this whole horrible episode will come down to a tick box on a form- you know the kind the dentist gives you when you go for a check up. I assumed this illness would become part of my medical history- instead it is my medical present and future.
I know this illness/condition doesn’t define me (that’s a lie, it totally does- at the moment anyway!) but it does define the rest of my life to a not insignificant degree.
I know that I can’t afford to go without sleep for too long, I won’t just get tired, I risk all sorts of nasty things happening.
I know that insisting on being a member of every local interest group and committee is perhaps a little too much for one person and will ultimately lead to one kind of episode or another.
I know that no one person needs three iPods and I know that Amazon and Ikea adore the manic.
When I am doing what ‘they’ want me to do and soldiering on, getting through the tough times and the really tough times and the not so tough times I always have it in the back of my mind that once I’m done that will be it, I’ll be better, cured and back to normal.
But it won’t be like that.
There will be more stressful events, more medication changes, more life just waiting to catch me unawares and there will always be the risk of this, or something like it happening again.
Which makes the fight just that little bit harder and seemingly less worthwhile.
So with todays horrible thought comes todays horrible lesson.
Not only do I have to get through this episode, I have to arm myself against future episodes, either to cope with them when they arise or prevent them entirely and after fighting through the last few days I can’t even begin to think about that.
We’ve ascertained I don’t like the broken leg analogy. I think a journey analogy is more appropriate and for me.
Today, I am still at the fiddling with the sat-nav and swearing stage- and the sat-nav is connected to a very slow, tired donkey who requires slow and gentle handling and very frequent stops. In my luggage I have some good friends, a great GP, a fantastic CPN, fellow bloggers and Tweeters and a big huge stash of Lorazepam.
* resisting loads of sarcastic comments here