I can't sleep!! Argh. Woke up with such a bad pain in my nose...of all places.

These are the scores for Beck's Depression Inventory:
1-10____________________These ups and downs are considered normal
11-16___________________ Mild mood disturbance
17-20___________________Borderline clinical depression
21-30___________________Moderate depression
31-40___________________Severe depression
over 40__________________Extreme depression
I scored 14 yesterday. That's down from 33 a few months ago. I feel like i might be normal, but when my mood is low it goes lower than is normal. But then, how would i know what normal is?! I don't. People keep saying how i feel now is normal, and i've been pathologising.

I looked at screens for EDs and anxiety and i'm not scoring highly on those either. Of course - not going to do so on anxiety disorder screens if i rigorously avoid all forms of anxiety though..

Makes me feel a little more confident at least.

Wooooo

i'm recovering from the flu now. That is good.

I've just got back from therapy. It's my last session, possibly forever, possibly 'for now', depending upon how i go. Anyway, i took Beck Inventories - one for anxiety and one for depression. I'm officially "recovered" from depression!!!! AWESOME.
Depression and bulimia down, just anxiety to go.

I've done a lot of writing in the past few months. I feel like i should organise it better, and use it in some way. I am good at writing afterall, and i've learnt a lot of things that need to be said.
I've got an understanding of some areas of psychiatry which would rival many experts. I have my biographical stuff describing in honest detail my experience of mental illness. There's so much ignorance that needs sorting, so many areas of need - SO much that needs to be done and said. I could say these things eloquently, but i don't know how to organise it all, and how to get it out there for people to see and think about. There's also facts and figures and theories i've picked up, and i'm constantly refining them and changing them and discarding them too, like an ongoing project, which also needs to be kept in mind.
My mind buzzes continuously with everything i know and have learnt, and so many people who could benefit from knowing, and all the different ways i could approach writing about it all. Sometimes i wonder if i should do blogs, make websites, write articles, do interviews, speak on youtube, write a book, express it through art, make leaflets? I'm not sure. I need to do it though, i'm buzzing with it.

I'm getting somewhere with therapy i think. I'm not neccessarily any happier, but i've learnt quite a bit, about myself and about life, and it's motivated me and given me optimism.

One thing i did, which helps my depression, is my mood chart. That's where i fill in a table, writing what i do every hour of the day with a number from 1 to 10 rating my mood. What i've learnt:
1. I've noticed patterns. I know what makes me happy and/or brings my mood up (artwork, eating, having a shower, sitting in the garden, playing music, going for a walk, listening to music, chatting to/being with people, going to the cinema and going to cafes), and i know what makes me depressed and/or what brings my mood down (spending too much time online, insomnia, watching mindless TV, doing nothing, being bored, getting up late in the morning). So quite simply - i'm in some control of my mood!!! ...however, i can't quite tell if activities REALLY bring my mood down, or if they just happen to be the things i choose to do when my mood is dropping..
2. From this, i've learnt that even the most simple things, like putting a CD on, or going in the garden with a cup of tea, can make you feel fantastic. Taking time to do these little things each day makes a world of difference.
3. I then learnt that often when you're having a really good time you're not fully conscious of it. And after having some reasonably good times in a row (like me being on holiday in edinburgh) your mind bundles it together and sees it in an extra positive light, making that time seem fantastic! (Though of course, if you have several bad times in a row, then it seems truly terrible. I guess that's a depressives cognitive distortion there..)
4. I've also learnt that conscientiousness can be a really BAD thing. On all my school reports my teachers mentioned it and thought it was amazing. However, it makes me work too hard and get too stressed, and it makes me feel guilty and consequently depressed if i don't spend all my time doing the "right" things.

I borrowed a book from my therapist called Overcoming Social Anxiety by Gillian Butler, which i'm going to buy, and work through the self-help section with the aid of my therapist. From the book i learnt some random bits of information and insights into SA:
1. about safety behaviours (eg, rehearsing a sentence before saying it to someone; agreeing with people; wearing unnoticable clothes)
2. how people with SA can be introverts or extroverts, and how it's wrong to label someone with SA as "introverted" because they don't neccessarily enjoy their own company and being quiet
3. thoughts come in many different forms, not just words, so often it's hard to identify what you're thinking or feeling
4. People with SA focus their attention on themselves much more than ordinary, and after a social interaction has occurred their memory of it will be warped because they only remember it in terms of how they felt and how they saw themselves, not by the reactions of the other people
5. if someone expects something threatening they will notice threats and potential threats much more
6. people have beliefs and assumptions about themselves, others and the world which influences how they percieve things

I've also learnt a bit more about my backgrounds influence upon how i am now:
Social Anxiety: was partly genetic, partly learnt from my mum's behaviour and anxieties, partly from my secluded upbringing, and was worsened by bullying and other events.
Depression: was partly genetic, partly learnt from my mum, partly from being socially isolated, partly from perfectionism, partly from acedemic/family pressures, partly extreme stress from events of the past few years, and partly biological from the damage of my eating disorder.
OCD: genetic and learnt from my family.
I've chosen not to get into my ED too much because i've been having such success trying to beat it, and i think i've got most of the support i need from others. However she did explain to me about the brain changes caused by EDs and why they cause depression, so that's given me extra motivation to keep fighting it.

Having a shower was hard work. Going to the loo is hard. This morning really threw me, it wasn't nice at all. I've had my shower though; my new shampoo smells lush.

I'm learning a lot about depression and how to deal with it. I've found a lot of spiritual bollocks stuff actually does help. In the past i'd skip over things like Get in touch with your inner child or try meditating for 20 minutes a day or learn to develop mindfulness in books and advice literature because it just seemed like wishy-washy crap.

It seems to be that you have to think about what depression makes you do, and combat those things, because every symptom just exacerbates the problem - like sleeping, avoiding people, not doing things. You have to avoid triggers of depression, like stress, boredom and negative-talk. You have to actually make the effort to look after yourself - eating healthily, exercising, doing things you enjoy, relaxing, sleeping right, avoiding drink/drugs, pampering yourself, getting sunshine, getting fresh air, wearing comfy clothes. Then you have to identify irrational thoughts and try turn them round, and stop assuming your thoughts are facts. 
One thing that helps to be aware of the world around you. Assuming you've removed stress and responsibilities from your life you have time to stop and think. It's good to live in the moment as it were. You experience life fully - you see, hear, smell, feel and taste the world around you. You're thinking of the present, which (unless you're in danger of being run over by a car or something) cannot hurt you, not like the future which is full of unknowns, or regrets and pain from the past. It's calming and grounding, you experience things ordinary people in their massive rush of life don't experience. You actually taste and feel the blueberry in your mouth, you notice the red roses as you walk to town (not racing down because you're late for work, munching on your breakfast and listening to your ipod, but walking slowing and mindfully), you notice and identify the aromas of dinners cooking as you sit in the garden.

On another note - Justin from the college just called!!! I'd emailed him earlier with a whole load of questions and worries about coping at college, and he's basically put my mind at rest by saying that if i'm enthusiastic about the course, try my best and tell him about what's going on, he and the college will make changes to accomodate me :)

I just read an interesting article in my psychology magazine about "Connectors" - people who have the ability to talk to anyone in any situation, and consequently network people.
According to the article connecting with people aids happiness (well, most people who have depression know that) but more importantly, it's connecting with people we don't know, and it's because we put our 'best face forward' and that therefore makes us feel good about ourselves. I guess that's only applicable to those who have some self-esteem and are not very shy, but it's still interesting.
Also, connecting with people must be physical connections, aka face-to-face. Our mental health in the Western world is suffering due to technology being a replacement for spending physical time together, and because our society focuses on the self, not a group. I guess i'm a prime example of this, living on LJ, haha. It's nothing compared to spending time with friends in real life.

I'd love to be a connector. Loz is one - he'll strike up a conversation with anyone, and both parties always come away smiling. He also knows a lot of people, and connections are of course useful on a practical level.
Maybe i'll be one one day. Long way to go though.

Just got home from therapy.
Wasn't much fun because i had to talk about Mum stuff, and i don't like doing that unless i specifically want to. Now i feel all horrible, especially because now she's dead it feels like i should make her look good as a person, and that's hard to do in therapy where you more-or-less bitch about your family members, because it's the bad things about them which fuck you up.
Ended up talking about my ED too. About time really, considering it's such a big thing in my life. I hate talking about it. It's so embarrassing and awkward. Wish it would just fuck off. I feel like such a knob when i talk about it. Especially when i'm asked to describe it in detail, or talk about how i feel about my body now. It's hard to say "i feel like a fatass" when you know that people aren't seeing it too, and after just looking at the weight-chart you're right down the low end. It's horrible to know you're crazy too. Crazy and disillusioned, seeing things that aren't there? I don't know. Maybe it's perspective not imagination. It's so fucking confusing.

I'm really fed up. 

I want drink. But drinking at 11am is not a good idea. Well maybe it is. I don't know.
Simultaneously i'd quite like to be asleep. Then i don't have to feel anything. Cos i feel rotten today. Headachey and miserable and fat and ugly and dirty and unmotivated and uninspired and irritated and disturbed.

I think i might remove my nail polish. The colour doesn't coordinate with my clothes and it's bothering me.

I can't sleep. It's rotten. 
As a result my mind was free to think on its own accord, and as a result it started dwelling on the past and made me kinda sad and angry. So i'm gonna write it all down and hopefully that will put a lid on it for a while by sharing, especially cos a lot of this i've not talked about much at all before.

Okay so i was dwelling on the past and thinking back to when i was 14-15-16 years old. That wasn't really a happy time. I don't really like who i was then...to be honest i think i was a loser. It's like, i had awful clothes, i was a little overweight, awful hair...aesthetically i was quite an ugly duckling. I hate how vain that all sounds, but it did bother me, and i was picked on for it, even by some of my own friends. I was comfort-eating like crazy, then got bulimia, and started to cut too. I first attempted suicide when i was 14 by overdosing on paracetamol after Amanda was a total bitch to me and i'd just had enough. I was sick all night, and in the end noone knew until later.
Then i was fainting over and over when i was 16 due to panic attacks and that was SHIT. It was so horrible living like that. I was always hurting after getting bruises or carpet burn or grazes, and even the odd broken finger or strained wrist. A couple of times at least i had fits too; one time i'd smacked myself so hard on the floor that my bracelet embedded itself into my wrist. Sometimes ambulances would be called and there'd be major fuss and it felt awful, cos i didn't feel ill, just tired and stressed. And then there was all the bloody hospital and doctors visits - GPs, paediatricians, a psychiatrist, a neurologist, blood tests, an MRI, an EEG (OOOOOWWWW. That was hell. The guy scratched at my skin on points of my head to remove all dead skin and hairs until it was red-raw, then put sticky gel stuff on, then stuck electrodes all over my head, then i had to sit there for about half an hour with bright lights flashing in my eyes), an ECG. Then there was the reactions of other people...like people staring, people only knowing me as "that girl who faints", friends not knowing how to deal with it, people being downright mean about it, my mum screaming at me for "being difficult", "lying to doctors" (i think she desperately wanted me to be physically ill, and hated that i agreed with doctors when they asked about psychological symptoms) and turning completely overprotective, Mr Pike excluding me from school twice, people making stupid jokes about it.
I've never really talked about that properly before. Trouble with being quiet, you talk so little that you don't talk properly about how damned umhappy you are, and damn i was unhappy then! I've actually got tears in my eyes right now thinking about back then. I have nightmares about that time now, about how shit it was, and how guilty and scared and angry i felt.

Then yeh, went to college, and i tried to be a different person. I guess one of the first things i tried to do to break myself away from that fainting, crying, cutting bulimic girl that i used to be was simply to change how i looked. I bought new clothes, had all my hair cut off, and then partway through the first year i relapsed into my ED due to stress of my mum being sick and trying to keep up such a facade, and by the summer holidays i was anorexic. My mum actually thought i was pregnant cos i wasn't eating much and i told her i hadn't had a period in months. I didn't even really know i had a problem then...it was kindof in the back of my mind but i guess i didn't really admit it to myself until that summer when i realised how much i fucked myself over. 

I guess it was after that summer that i started writing on LJ and became really honest about what's been going on. It's so much easier to talk through a keyboard, sat on your own, especially at 5am on a sunday morning. I guess you know the rest of the story - i became bulimic again, mum got leukaemia again, i got depression, mum had her bone marrow transplant, she had brain damage and became disabled and really REALLY ill, i didn't get into uni, mum died, i quit life completely, Loz cheated, and i've been in a depressed stupor ever since.

So i guess my ED is partly about me trying not to go back to that sad schoolgirl i used to be. One thing that made me different at college was i was thin...not that i saw it. I hate hate HATE this constant focus on weight i have...it's so unimportant and vain and self-absorbed, and i suppose selfish because there's nothing wrong with my weight. All this focus on weight and food i guess is about having a sense of control, and about not being that girl i was, and i guess to distract myself from the shitness of life in general.

I hope someone reads this and comments. I don't really know why, maybe just so i know someone read, and i'm not alone with all this shit in my head anymore.

I only started the Cities project yesterday, but it's already going fabulously and i'm enjoying it. I love it when i enjoy college projects. I always have done to an extent, but this year of doing art under my own steam i've discovered just how much i love art, and how to make projects work so that i enjoy them.
I'm going to focus on Bristol and do a focus upon dark vs light, monotones vs colour. That will include how different people view the city, and incorporate crime, racial/religious/cultural tensions and crosses of old and new. I think bringing in social and political issues is a good thing....well it was for A Level marks, but i'm glad i'm genuinely interested, not just doing it cos i should! Being Bristol it'll also be personal (my mum was in hospital there for 5 months, and i'd escape into the city when my depression and worries from normal life got too much).
It's good.

I've got such a nice cup of tea with me right now. I've been working in my room with candles and a jazz CD - little touches like that are great.

I've had a productive day really.
Keeping busy seems to be extremely important to warding off depression. I don't know if it's because i'm distracting myself or if it's because i'm not constantly beating myself up for not doing enough. Whatever - it's good. I can see interesting patterns coming up on my mood chart.

I don't know how much i've mentioned it...but my family are freaks. Seriously.. scarily intelligent.
My dad has an IQ of 159 i think, and used to belong to Mensa until he left because he thought it was boring, and has written two books. Emmy wrote part of a book at age 11, and also took extension papers in her year 6 SATs and got a level 8 in one of her year 9 SATs (and some other stuff). Both my parents got the best GCSE results in their schools...grammar schools (which took only the top 10% of kids in the first place). And loads of other stuff like that.
Family games of Scrabble are hellishly humiliating.

Me....zilch. Completely the odd one out. GCSE and A Level grades lower than the school and college averages.
I don't think i'm bothered though, not really. Often i'll lose track in conversations because i'm simply not able to keep up with words i don't know and complex theories. I'm not thick, i know, just not conventionally smart like my family.

Anyway, the point of all this is my therapist says a recurring theme with me is the fear of being seen as stupid. It's a fear of negative judgement mostly, but fear of being seen as a total dumbass comes up a lot. And i wonder if my upbringing in a freak-family had anything todo with it. I don't know.
I don't consciously care how smart/dumb i am. My parents, as soon as they realised i was different, started telling me i was special in my own ways. And i see myself that way most of the time.
However, there is a definite anti-stupidity in my family. The ultimate criticism is the word "stupid", and my dad especially will not 'suffer fools gladly'. It upsets me a bit, cos someone can't really help if they're born a dumbass. My dad will actively avoid people who are not near the same intelligence level as him. Maybe i am fearing stupidity on an unconscious level then...

I hate self-diagnosis, but, it does match up.
I'm really quite nervous about it. I just want to be normal. Or at least...go back to my 'normal'.. i think, anyway.

My mood has been lowering this afternoon, and is definitely crashing now, and it feels strange to be relieved about that.

This is HILARIOUS and SO CUTE!!! It's only a few seconds long, and watch with the sound up!

Bath was okay. It was kinda very busy (aka daunting) and it was grey and drizzly so i've hardly got any photos. I got some shorts which are alright. And dad decided he liked the T-rex CD i wanted...so he bought it!

The good/joyous/insane/hyper mood lasted throughout the morning, and though it's still there it's dampened this afternoon/evening by being so damn exhausted. It doesn't feel normal at all. It feels like i'm all sped up, i can't keep still, i talk like a crazy motormouth, i haven't slept well at all, my head is bursting with ideas and thoughts like fireworks, and, logically, i shouldn't have been happy for the past few days. Not really - sunday was the anniversary, a friend of a friend committed suicide, the friend is in a really bad way, and the weather is being rubbish. But still i've been absolutely ecstatically happy.
It sounds like mania written down. It's not normal i'm sure. But then, how would i know what is normal? If you're in an episode of mania, do you know you are? 
I'm really kindof scared by it actually. Partly because it's so unnatural and unexpected, and also because i know this can't last....and what will my mood do next? What if it crashes really hard with disasterous consequences? Especially considering i'm leaving to go to Edinburgh in less than 3 days....

Well...I'm back. Loz has been around for a couple of days so i've been LJ-deprived.

Sooo...mmm...ART!!!!! I saw these in ed_art (warning: potentially triggering) and i've not seen such talent or expression in....a long long time. I'm completely in awe, and also incredibly jealous.
I've also been experimenting with my oil pastels...


And next....therapy! I went to my first therapy session yesterday. It wasn't as daunting as the anxiety as was getting warranted...but what's new lol. 
It gave me a LOT of optimism about the future, and she really thinks she can help. I also wouldn't have had a place with her if i had bottled out and got my dad or psychiatrist to phone her, but because i did it she was so pleased & proud she fitted me in.
She actually thinks i can be a paramedic if i want!!!!!!!!! She actually thinks it's feasable with enough work, not just a dream.
She was also asking about my motives for doing art at college, and we kindof uncovered that my reason for doing it is to pass time doing something interesting and worthwhile, and to please the people around me...and of course those aren't good reasons to be doing a course if you have very little intention of continuing your education or career in that direction. I'd never thought of it that way before, for the past 2-3 years i've had I Must Do Art Foundation drilled in my head.


And lastly....shopping!!! 

Oh goodness.
I got a letter from the therapist saying she has got space for me. There's also an invoice thing - each session with her costs £75 (double the number for $). She said i'd need about 20 sessions....£1500?!!?!?!?!!! SHIT!!! The health insurance dad has with work will pay some - between now and october there's £340 available for it (and if bupa pays, the cost goes up to £85), and the funds willl be topped up for the next year after that.

I'm really scared - what if the therapy doesn't help, and all that money is wasted? Depression is the focus of the treatment...what if that's all physical/chemical? Okay, that would mean that the anti-depressants should have helped, but still. I don't feel like i think irrationally. Maybe i do. I fear things irrationally, but i'm not sure if that can be changed.
Oh i don't know. I feel like i'll be under so much pressure to 'just get better'. And i don't feel like i deserve so much money to be spent on me, especially when i feel like i'm too weak to change.

And here i go - gotta attack the NHS. My dad has half his salary taken off in taxes with the expectation that his money will be used well. He should expect that if one of his children gets ill she should get the treatment she needs. But nnooo... not sick enough for the year-long waiting list! The same NHS that through its poor care killed my mum. Okay, they did spend half a million on her treatment, but even then through stupid mistakes she died. Makes me angry to think "where the hell is all the tax going?!". I bet it's all on the Iraq war or something, and i bet you can guess my opinions on that.

It's based on part of a Klimt painting.


I swear this kids taste in clothes gets more electic by the day.

And lastly - therapists.
Every therapist or psychiatrist i come across seems to enjoy 'pointing the finger of blame' at one of their patientss family members. In my family it's my dad. My mums counsellor managed to completely turn my mum against my dad, claiming he was holding her back and undervalued women due to 'childhood issues' and a whole load of other crap like that, causing massive problems in my parents marriage, a lot of tears and anger, and big issues concerning my mums will (Faye might remember the whole leaving-Josie-all-the-money-behind-dads-back extravagenza last year).
And then every single damn therapist/psychiatrist/psych nurse/etc I come across seems to want to point the finger of blame at my dad too!! They don't seem to want to believe that he's perfectly okay and that we get on well! Don't know quite what their motivation is, i guess it makes their job easier if they just blame a parent for their patients problems.
Idk. I'm just concerned that therapists and psychiatrists have huge power to manipulate their patients view of their problems, especially considering their patient would be vulnerable and be laying a huge amount of trust and responsibility to their therapist or psychiatrist to make them better.
And tthheenn I was reading and it's been claimed that some private therapists are intentionally making their patients sicker and are claiming they have more problems than they do to get more money! So very wrong and twisted to mess with vulnerable sick people like that...

Today i got to the end of reading Born on a Blue Day by Daniel Tammet (which i wrote about originally here).

It's such a great book - amazing to see how Daniel thinks and feels - he is so good at describing such complex things. His life so far, even though he's only in his 20s, is fascinating, and you feel so proud and happy for him as he battles through life and becomes independent, despite being so different and finding many 'easy' and essential things so difficult. 
Despite being somewhat out-of-touch with emotions due to the austism, his writing has the ability to really move you. His description of falling in love with his current partner Neil, and of the death of their cat in particular, moved me to tears. Very few books do that.

I found it really inspirational in my own way because even though i'm not autistic, not a savant, and don't have synaesthesia, i really identified with a lot of his experiences, feelings and fears, especially regarding social situations, and feeling 'different'. It seems autism has many similarities to anxiety disorders - in particular social anxiety disorder and OCD - and maybe that's why i identify so well.
There are many things he wrote which seriously 'clicked' with me and how i am:

"My parents tell me that in nursery school i was a loner, not mixing with the other children, and described by the supervisors as being in my own world."

"My poor coordination made learning how to swim a slow and frustrating process; I was the last child in my class to be able to swim the width of the pool. I was frightened of the water, of being pulled under and not being able to return to the surface. The pool instructors were sympathetic and gave me armbands and foam blocks to help me float safely, but my difficulty only helped reinforce the sense that i was different and seperate from my peers, who could all swim seemingly effortlessly years before i could make my first strokes."

"There is something exciting and reassuring for individuals on the autistic spectrum about communicating with other people through the internet. For one thing, talking in chatrooms or by email does not require you to know how to initiate conversation or when to smile or the numerous intricacies of body language, as in other social situations. There is no eye contact and it is possible to understand everyones every word because it is written down."

"This experience showed me more than any other that i really was now able to make my own way in the world, to do things for myself that most people take for granted such as travel at short notice, stay alone in a hotel or walk a busy street without feeling overwhelmed by the different sights and sounds and smells all around. I feel elated by the thought that all my efforts had not been in vain, but had taken me to a point beyond my wildest dreams."

I have finally finished sorting through my magazines, and have sorted out all the cuttings.