Grief

 So it's three in the morning. I'm sat here with a glass of wine, a ciggie*, and the Blue Belles Back Catalogue playlist. And I think about all of the people I've been fortunate enough to meet; and the ones I've been more fortunate to forget about. And today I've lost somebody I've lost somebody that has been there for me since year dot. Somebody I didn't think I'd be without for many, many years to come; somebody I never thought I'd actually not have in my life - for whatever reason.

 My Dad met Russ 43 years ago when they were still in primary school. That's quite impressive; I remember meeting my bestie about twenty years ago and I think we're pretty much two halves of the same person about now. Russ has been there throughout the entirety of my (almost) twenty three years of existence. He's been there at an age where I got the stand from a goldfish bowl stuck round my neck; when I looked like a screaming beetroot; when I found out I'd gotten into university; when I lost my first tooth; when I got engaged; when he met my partner; when I was a scared little kid. Always there with a cuddle and a wheezy laugh.

 We'd talk about politics, the environment, history, gender equality, and - most importantly - making fun of my Dad. After all: what are best friends for? I truly aspire to be this similar influence in my friends' children's' lives. In fact I remember her daughter being less than a week old, going to see her for the first time and seeing a UKIP broadcast , and holding the baby close, covering her eyes and ears and whispering 'shhh, don't worry, the nasty frog man will `gone soon. Then - almost a year later - waking up on her Mam's settee to the same kid chewing on my bag strap and belt, while her Mam made coffee. There I was, lying hungover on a settee, snowing outside, my best friend making me coffee and breakfast, while her daughter sat on the floor chewing and drooling on my clothes for the day. We were basically sharing nappy cream at the time, seeing as I'd just gotten a new tattoo and she's still wearing nappies.Now she's two. And I remember being that age and playing with Uncle Russ. It can be such a critical age in a kid's life, I'm still not at a conclusion. I don't know how to conclude somebody like Russ. He's my very strange; bipolar buddy; fellow conspiracy theorist; fantasy war-gamer; raging leftie; constant presence in my life; helping me develop and become confident in my own style.

 Basically... I'm a fucking wreck. But Paul, and some good tunes, are keeping me nice and grounded. I might seem "out of control" to others - I am slightly -, but to me and Paul arne managing perfectly. The only time our routine goes tits up is when shit like this happens. Anyway, my plan for the...next day is to write a letter to Uncle Russ's daughter. She is basically my sister from another mister. I was about 11, 12ish when we first met, and you were about...18 months? And if Russ spoke to you the same way my Dad spoke to me about Russ... Then we could easily flip the scenario and you would most likely be the one wondering how I'm doing. Having,  in that case, me losing a father and you losing a father figure. Babe, I remember when I was...12, and you were tiny, picking you up under the arms and spinning you round - with all of my small child strength, going "whee!" and you squealing with delight. And I remember having the most amazing week with you and your Dad that week, finally meeting you after your Dad telling me I was getting a little cousin. I know I've been absent for a lot of your life Tills, but I'd really like to change that. Mostly so that you know you have three very willing and able candidates for a spare Dad: my Dad, my Brother, and my Partner. I know that they will never make up for you losing your own Dad, and they won't make up for me losing him either, but they're my only other male role models and I can't bare the thought of you going through life without a somewhat cynical but overall positive male role model. I write this to you as a feminist, and somebody who will always love you no matter what, and will offer you somewhere to stay for however long you need whatever the circumstance. Love you Tills.

So yeah, I'm a wreck of a human. What am I going to do?
Lizi


*Anybody who read this far had to know it was a spiff. Otherwise the rest wouldn't have made sense.

Mental Health Trends and Mindfulness: Just Give Me My Damn Pills

 Current mood: wine, bitter, pissed off. Improving.

 This is going to get a bit heavy and rambly in places, as I'm not in the best one at the minute.

 I've been going through some part of the mental health service or another since I was sixteen. I'm not embarrassed about it and I shouldn't be. The majority has been one-on-one counselling, though I had some brief flirtation with group therapy; that was a fucking barrel of laughs and it's just kept getting funnier. It's been wonderful in the past few years to see more people opening up and finally talking about the matter. Yet I've noticed as more people come forward there has been more and more marketisation of services and self-help. One night, at an extremely low point, I rang the Crisis Team and was asked by the guy on the phone if I had tried a colouring book, or a mindfulness app? Of course! Because when somebody is feeling at absolute rock-bottom all the need is to do some pretty pictures or piss about on their phone. Not to mention that sleep deprivation is a key factor in many people hitting crisis point, and the light from electronic devices being proven to negatively impact those sleepy hormones, so hunching over your smart phone is obviously the best thing to do. Anyway, I'm getting off topic. 

 Mindfulness has been lauded as some sort of mental health buzzword in the past few years and honestly? My mind is totally full. I know when I'm being a dick. I know when I'm being irrational. I know why I want to behave like this, even when I know it's not healthy. There's honestly so much crap in there I've reached the brim, and I know I'm nearing boiling point. Tell me one more time to colour in and I might take that pencil to your eye. The mental health system itself has a history of taking the sticky plaster approach: treating the symptoms rather than the root cause. I firmly believe that if service users had more one-on-one work to establish the cause earlier on rather than throwing them into whatever therapy type is trendy at the time then it'd save a lot of time, money, and suffering all round. 

 Historically, if you go back one hundred years or so then the popular thing to do was stick anybody with a mental illness in an asylum. It required two doctors' signatures for admittance, but eight for a release. Fifty years ago they were handing out lobotomies like they were "i didn't bite the dentist" stickers. Twenty years ago it was all about popping pills and self-help books. Now we're in somewhat of a limbo phase of what could be a brilliant mental health service, or the lunatics taking over the asylum, so to speak.

 I get that arts, crafts, and writing can be helpful for mental health. Fuck sake, I'd be a hypocrite if I didn't! Half of the posts on here are the result of some crazed manic or depressive moment. I've been through CBT, DBT, talking therapy, psychiatric evaluation, waitings lists, medication, medication changes, medication withdrawal. And what has been most consistent through all of that is my medication. Other than the brief month I had my meds changed and I believed I was the She-Kraken from the depths of Hell. That was... Not fun. For anybody. At all. Anyway. I had my last psychiatric evaluation over a year ago now and, while I have a Community Psychiatric Nurse (CPN) to work with and she's absolutely wonderful, I have yet to have an updated diagnosis from that evaluation. And the funny part? My original referral was for eating disorder treatment. Have I had any targeted help for that? Have I fuck! 

 But after countless rounds of CBT and Talking Therapy I was finally referred for DBT with my CPN (I'm busting out all the acronyms here!) I've had a look through what DBT is and to be honest? I get it. I get what Dialectical Behavioural Therapy is, I get what it's used for, and I get how it can be helpful. However I also believe that the whole premise of how it's presented is utter bollocks. In my last appointment I was asked if I'd been remembering my something-or-others, I'll call it my 'Here Man!s' for the sake of this post. And I truly couldn't remember what it was! Because it was, like, six simple points that had been over complicated in order to sound scientific and medical. It was something to do with physical health, eating, exercise and other bollocks. But having it called a 'Here Man!' when I'm trying to finish my final year of uni, at a time when what I should be focused on learning Sociology and key feminist theory, finishing my dissertation, I'm stuck in a counselling room trying to remember what 'Here Man!' stands for. And it isn't even that word, it's some other twisted acrostic poem to make the whole practice of therapy sound more scientific and weighted. Almost like those stupid songs or rhymes you learn in maths and science classes to calculate average speed and other bollocks. I can understand to others that it might make the therapy type seem more 'real' and 'provable', but to me it just makes me want to punch whatever bastard came up with them in the face. I get the principles, I get the helpful methodology, but asking me to remember what 'Here Man!' means makes me feel tested. It puts performance pressure on me in a space where I've come for treatment and I can't do it. It's like asking for help and then being reminded that you're under exam conditions and that you're the failure for not remembering it. 

 My CPN said to me this week that I seemed unusually distracted. She's used to me spacing out sometimes but this session was rife with periods of me staring off into space, partially listening and not really taking anything in. And I wholly agree. I felt that I'd failed, not remembering what 'Here Man!' stood for, as it was something I should have been practicing in order to get better. But again, when you're at such a low point that you don't even want to get out of bed or open your eyes, do you really want to waste your time trying to remember what the H, the E, the R, the other E, etc, all stand for? 

 One of the suggestions from this session was that I check out something called the Recover College Collective. It offers BTECs and stuff and helps with mental health apparently, it's like peer-mentoring for crazy people. I had a look at the 'prospectus' with my CPN and, while it sounds interesting, I completely zoned out. Emotional regulation through interpretive dance? Art classes? Writing? This is the shit that turns me off therapy. I'm sick of sticking fancy labels on simple concepts to make them sound more credible. I'm sick of colouring books being the cure-all solution for anxiety. Because when people hit a bad patch, try these things, and they don't work, we feel like failures. We feel like we're failing at getting better. And it's not fun. It's really not fun.

 I'm not writing this as something against these therapy types or anything else, I'm writing it from my experience. Giving something a stupid name and label doesn't make it a cure, and it doesn't make it helpful. It might make it sound more credible to those who try to measure it as a biological experiment, but for me it just means frustration. It means headaches I don't need, reading I don't want to do, and interacting with new people that I don't want to meet. All I want is a therapy type where somebody will tell it how it is, without making it sound either sciency-fancy or arty-farty. Is that too much to ask?


 Note: this isn't me condemning these therapy types, I can't stress that enough. But shoving them down somebody's throat when they're already sick to fucking death of saying 'help, I don't understand' isn't helpful.

Three Little Pills: Adventures in Antidepressants

 I've been debating whether or not to post something about this but hey, as I'm still awake I might as well. About three weeks ago I had an appointment with my psychiatrist, in the run-up to this my anxiety had been in check, the horrible migraines it used to bring on were no longer part of my daily routine thanks to the increased dose of my meds. However for whatever reason my depression had been rearing its ugly head, and while I didn't know if it was because of Christmas having just gone and the stress that comes with it hanging over me, the back-to-university panic setting in, or just my brain deciding to be mean to me for shits and giggles.

10am yesterday, calling it bedtime in Monday's clothes

 We discussed my sleeping patterns, and how little sleep I tend to get, and even long sleep tends to be poor quality (you try having reoccurring dreams about having Vladimir Putin as your Year 9 English teacher). In the end she decided to prescribe me some new medication to work alongside my current ones. They would hopefully calm me down and overall help me sleep. By this point I was willing to try damn near anything, I could barely remember the last time I had a decent night's sleep. The new tablets were green and purple, and combined with my current prescription of course my first thought was "yay! Suffragette-coloured meds!". My first night on them came with the typical new substance anxiety, I felt like a teenager trying out drinking again. But within an hour or so I was flat out, it was hands-down the best sleep I've had all year. Remember though, it's not February yet.

 I even managed to get up early, by my standards, the next morning and already couldn't wait to go back to bed. Not in my usual "ugh, I'm always so exhausted" sort of way, but because I was so excited to experience a decent sleep again after so long. But like they say you can have too much of a good thing. By the time I got into bed that night I wasn't feeling tired, despite having worn myself out looking after my niece that afternoon, and instead I climbed into bed with a head full of swirling thoughts and anxieties, going deeper than they had previously. I didn't sleep until 5 the next morning and even then only managed a few hours. The rest of my time on this medication led to a recurring pattern: one night of blissful, uninterrupted sleep, the next plagued by a new level of anxiety. Through the day I would feel flat, no energy and no drive. I felt the worst I had in months. The house was neglected, I wasn't feeding myself properly, and I was no longer looking after myself mentally. No matter how good the possibility of sleeping on a normal schedule sounded I knew that they weren't the right meds for me. I've made the decision not to name them because I don't want to influence anybody else's decision to take them.

 A few weeks later and here I am, 3am on my third night without them. 3 days into sweats, shakes, and the 6 hours of sleep I've had overall, when I'd gotten to the point where I was too exhausted to shake and sweat anymore. I'm currently lying in the empty bath, wrapped in a blanket with the window open. It's the only place in the house where I'm perfectly between being warm and cool, and there's room for me to lie down. Plus I won't wake Paul up in here. I'm sure that some of you might roll your eyes and think "drama queen"; I've barely gave them a try, if I keep at them they'll settle down, I shouldn't feel as ill so soon without them. I'll address the last one first and tell you why that's bollocks. Before I started taking them the psychiatrist went through all of the possible side effects of both taking them and finishing them, my blood pressure is ridiculously low - despite being a 'salted is better than sweet' type of popcorn gal - and blood pressure was mentioned in all of the side effects. Plus I'm allowed to be a wuss sometimes. Secondly, I know my own body, and know what it feels like when my body doesn't accept something; this was definitely one of these times. Because of this, and past experiences, I knew that it would be better for me in the long-run to to quit now rather than wait and see how it goes. 

 And, one person to shut you all up, my psychiatrist at yesterday's group therapy (which I can't say anything else about due to confidentiality, other than I think it's a pile of wank) said that I had made the ultimately right decision. She says she's seen people who thought they should come off of a certain medication wait it out just that little bit longer, and ultimately end up worse for it. I'm tired of putting my body through unnecessary amounts of meds in order to see what happens. I'm not a guinea pig, having no say over what the effects on me are as opposed to what they could be (totally against vivisection btw), and not being able to say no. While this may not be helpful advice for others it helped me get these past few days off of my chest. Several of my burly sisters said I looked like I should have probably been in bed but honestly I just feel much better knowing how I'll feel once they're totally out of my system, but thank you for being lovely ladies! Keep an eye out soon for more burlesque-related posts coming soon, despite how weak the link was here...

 I've honestly never been a fan of self-care or mindfulness, I think they're both a load of bollocks. No, I'm not asking for a fight here; no, I don't care if you disagree with me; no, I am not willing to discuss why I feel this way about it with you; no, I don't give a shit. I was once on the phone to the district mental health Crisis Team when I was told by one of their advisers to try a mindfulness app or an adult colouring book while I had been screaming down the phone to him at breaking point. He rang back after I hung up on him, not to check how I was, but to tell me I was rude for swearing at him when I suggested where he could stick said colouring book. I digress. But this situation is one of the first where I can truly say that I was mindful of my own body and its needs, and took care of myself by stopping these tablets.

 Ugh. No. That was beyond cheesy. I hate myself for that line. Ew.

 Anyway, I think I'm starting to get sleepy. Sweet dreams and sweet potatoes; guys, gals, and NB pals x

The Holy Grail? Birth Control for Men

When my mind is racing, to the point where I can feel nothing else but the tension and the buzzing across my forehead, I know that one of three things will calm me down; a drink, a chat or a blog post. Preferably all three in one. Sometimes, like tonight, that chat is with myself but I find that chats between Lizi, myself and I always lead to some interesting thoughts. And where else to start but where every girl's mind should be on Halloween - birth control pills/injections for men, yikes!

Now this is something I've seen news and 'news' articles floating around the web about since...oof, at least since I started using social media. So say 8 years ago, or at least this was the first time I'd heard of the idea. And as a slightly overweight, spotty and angsty fourteen-year-old you see such things and think "Yes!! There is justice in the world!", then you suddenly forget about it as you're distracted by somebody who sits behind you in your Physics class sending you a chicken on Farmville (admit it, you've had similar moments). Yet years later, in your twenties - older and a little wiser at least -, your braces finally off and you've wrecked your teeth from too many drunken attempts at drinking from a glass without a straw instead of sucking your thumb... You see it again. Almost at the point of completion... And it's still "a long way off" in case men get sad.

 Yes, after one too many: cat-calls, unsolicited dick pics, gropes, sexual assaults, threats of violence, unwanted opinions, put-downs, manipulations; something which could potentially delayed and forgotten about in case it could be bad for men.

 Story. Of. Every. Woman's. Fucking. Life.

 As the possibility of birth control for men has grown closer and closer - the risks and side effects sensationalised, a potential release date, it makes me wonder: given the excessive side effects given to birth control for those of us with a uterus, if it were to be developed today, would something with so many detrimental side effects would they be approved for use? Or like in the case of the pill would the side effects be listed but the extent of them be swept under the rug? When women taking progesterone-based birth control are 34% more likely to be prescribed antidepressants, and these statistics only recently having been published, it beggars belief that they would be approved today. That's not even starting on the excessive physical side effects.

  This has led to a lot of angry women, understandably. Many women have shouted back, saying that it's now time for men to bare the brunt of these side effects that we have for decades too. And I agree with them too, I really do. Given the state of my mental health it's gotten me thinking, for the past seven years I've been pumped full of synthetic hormones in some way or another (both pills, the injection, mirena coil). What are they actually doing to my mind and body? I've gotten an appointment booked with my GP and will be running it past my CPN (psychiatric nurse) to see whether switching to something non-hormonal, such as a copper coil, could potentially do me some good. It's not fair that women should be more or less expected to fill themselves full of synthetic hormones to avoid the 'punishment' of getting pregnant if they should dare want to have sex. 

 I was put on these hormones at a time when my body was still developing, when I was still trying to figure out who I was. The pill was meant to be a solution to try and calm me down, help me handle my periods better at a time when everything was still settling down and finding its feet. And it terrifies me that after years of trial and error that I may not know myself without synthetic hormones, it really fucking scares me. But it's gotten me thinking, and anybody who knows me knows that it physically pains me to write this, what about the men? Sorry, excuse me while I vomit and berate myself for even typing that but hear me out. While suicide rates for women have increased in the past few years, they are still three times higher for men. Do we really want to see this increase? And keep in mind the horrific state of mental health services at the minute. 

 I'm looking at a solution to this in the same way I explain socialism to people. It's not about fighting to all be on the same, shitty minimum wage that nobody can survive on; it's about fighting for a decent living wage for everybody. In this case I don't want more men to be put at risk of mental and physical health issues, I want to see a fuck-off-massive improvement in current hormonal contraception for women. Make sure that the pill, the coil, implants, what have you, all come with the lowest risk possible for women's mental and physical health before we start saying everyone should suffer the same.

 Now, shock-horror, as you've probably guessed by now I'm not a doctor. But I'm somebody with a uterus who is pretty scared of the idea of more side effects from my birth control. And somebody who enjoys having sex and not having children. And I would really like to be able to continue having sex and not getting pregnant while not being at risk of uterus perforation, hair loss and all kinds of cysts. Is this really too much to ask?

National Coming Out Day 2016: Family-phobia, mental health, and breaking the cycle

 So the other week I posted a piece about Bi Visibility Week which included my own coming out story. As those of you on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum and good allies know, 'coming out' isn't a one-off experience; it's a staggered constant experience. Coming out to friends and family, then there's more to come when it comes to co-workers, peers, and new acquaintances. And in some cases other family members, beyond those who you initially knew would understand. You take that chance, thinking you've come this far and this person loves you enough to not give two shits about it. Well, that's what you think.

 I decided to get this off of my chest in a post, in order to get it out of my head so I can move on and stop stewing on it. It's difficult though. I'd spent the day with a relative last Friday; we had lunch, shopped, and talked about all sorts. It got to the point that we were talking about current TV programmes and talked about Poldark, it's a show I never managed to get into the storyline but happily watched a few episodes of because *swoon* Aiden Turner! Such a gorgeous man, I watched it just to look at him. The conversation moved to the new Victoria series on ITV and, being a fan of Jenna Coleman from her portrayal as Clara in Doctor Who, I expressed to this relative that I found her very good-looking. It was an innocent comment, yet this relative managed to read my undertones: that I found her attractive rather than just expressing an admiration for her looks.

 That's when shit hit the fan and it all spiralled down. While it showed progress for somebody of their generation that they accepted that they know some people are gay and accept that, they refused to accept that a person can be bisexual. Apparently "you can't ride two horses with one arse", and that's what confused me. Confused me in terms of my mental health and has done me damage; dating women is what has caused me to become mentally ill according to this relative. It's funny when I think about it because it wasn't a woman who sexually assaulted me, it wasn't a woman who made me feel it was my fault, it wasn't a woman who made me feel utterly worthless and broken when I thought I could trust them. Relationships with women tend to have been the healthiest I've had (other than my relationship with Paul, he is the exception to the rule!) and have always left me with a better understanding of myself. For somebody to try and throw that in my face as something that has done me damage makes me feel sick. In fact being told this made me cry in front of this relative for the first time in years.

 In fact I think that is what made me most angry, that they made me cry. A good rule I try to follow is that a relative shouldn't make you cry out of sadness unless they're dying/have died. To try and make me feel so ashamed about my sexuality and my mental health in one fell swoop, trying to blame one on the other, makes me feel physically sick. This was probably the most recent point lately that I've felt utterly helpless, and almost embarrassed to by myself. Though it wasn't shame about myself I felt, but more ashamed of myself for being stupid enough to open up to this relative, thinking they would react kindly.


 I have told my parents about this experience and, when opening up to them about how this relative has treated me about my mental health, they have grown concerned about my relationship with them and offered to talk to them about it. It has done me a lot of damage. I've gone through about two years of being told by this relative that my mental health doesn't matter, that I've made it all up. But this has been my breaking point, going from downright dismissing my mental health to blaming it on my sexuality, something that I cannot and would not change for the world.

 We've always been told since we were children to respect our elders, or the more condescending that they're old and don't know any better, and should do so regardless. But after this experience I'm not sure that I can unquestioningly follow this rule. I still love this family member dearly, and do not at all regret my decision to come out to them, but it will take me a while to forgive them.