Living and working with anxiety and depression 28th December 2021 Day 68 The one where I stand still and look where I am now.....

 ....... Well hello and I hope you are all enjoying and surviving the Christmas period. We're currently in betwixed week when no-one seems to know what to do or where to go unless they're at work.

More importantly I sincerely hope that any readers who suffer have managed to get through it all without too much negative intervention.

Using my personal experience as a kind of window on life for those who experience the ups and downs of Depression and Anxiety it's been a better few days than I was expecting. I am pleased to say.

And although I am feeling more than a little anxious about my return to work in the next two weeks, I feel strong enough now to know that such fears no longer control me but that I am in charge now. 

I know that after a couple of hours back in the workplace I will have found my routine and be doing my job again. A day I look forward to. Especially when once again I look back to where I found myself just a short time ago.

However I'm not ready yet and to return too soon would test my boundaries beyond reasonable safety. I am a changed person this time. I've learned that like many others who go through this stuff, I have previously repaired myself with a goal of finding who I was before my episode and fully reconnecting with them. Indeed until recently that's what I was working towards once again. .... Getting back to who and what I was!

But maybe that's a mistake. There's a hell of a lot of work involved in the reconnection processes and I can't comment for others but I've never felt fully recovered. In fact looking back I've never actually found that "default" me to reboot from. 

So each time in my life that I've hit reset I've not realised that the default is damaged at source. Therefore I'm reconnecting with a corrupted hard drive. 

When we experience a deep routine changing episode the wiring of the person we are trying find becomes damaged. 

We have experienced events that have changed our blueprint so our mainframe will adapt and work a little differently from time to time.

Therefore we can spend so much time, effort and heartache attempting to re-engage with what we think we are and not who we really are.....

.... Am I making sense?....

This can be a tiring and at times destructive process as it becomes self defeating because we don't see that we've gone through personality changing events and therefore we fail to make allowances when we can't fully reconnect.

This time around I'm stopping the fighting to be able to fight. 

I'm accepting that I'm a different person. Changes have come about not just from this period of transition but previous episodes that I've not been so accepting of. 

I'm definitely what some would call Fragile. I'm even more mindful than I was. 

I feel that the hesitancy I've battled for years against is actually a part of me. So I now welcome it.  

So I'm still using my recovery time to adjust to being the new me instead of the old me. 

But I'm seeing positive changes in my behaviour. 

And my independence is returning. 

I'm more or less comfortable being out and about alone. 

I now take a regular dosage of ALL of my required medication not just what I think is needed. 

I've started conversing with people I know when I see them instead of looking away.

I'm aware of changes now apparent in my boundaries. So I steer away from discomfort.

I am now more likely to choose the quieter path ...... unless absolutely necessary.

I still have battles to fight both personally and openly. Mentally and physically. I have to be at a level of mental strength to be able to talk about my absence from work as well as about my illness as openly as I believe we should be able to. I have to be ready for the workplace. But it also has to be ready for me. 

I and by that I mean WE . My family have so far lost three months..... Twelve bloody weeks of our lives. During which time things have been pretty tough between Faith and myself. Let alone just getting from day to day. Because I closed down and lost the plot.

Who the f*CK had the right to do this to us?

I'm at that crossroads that all sufferers reach on their way back . I can choose the security of my shell and the ever present threat of loneliness and depression. Or I can gently feel my way forward in the dim light hoping my confidence grows that bit more than my fear each day. But I remain aware of my triggers and fears. The crossroads only comes to you when you believe enough in yourself to know that going forward is an option. So I have a choice now that I didn't previously have.

Please remember that someone you know is dealing with this stuff every minute of their day. A family member, a friend, an acquaintance or even yourself.

Look after each other.

Pete x