When I needed a neighbour were you there?

So goes the school hymn, and goes through a range of situations  asking 'were you there?'  'And the creed and the colour and the name don't matter were you there?' comes the chorus.

This comes to mind with an email today from someone about a church member they have visited today, reporting that this person, unable to get out of the house, is disappointed that I haven't been round.

It is not an unreasonable request, after some time in convalescence care beyond our patch she has been home for a couple of weeks now. And it would be just half an hour, to show she is remembered.  'Were you there?'

These are the moments when I feel such a failure as a minister, and as I type my eyes are leaking.  But she and the others I constantly let down don't see that, they don't know about the moments when I am about to phone but realise it is too late, or any other good intentions.

Yes it is true that pastoral visiting is not just for me, and I know of those who are calling on people. And I know that my list of reasons why I didn't get there all this week despite planning to - including depressive fatigued duvet days - are valid and not just the lame excuses I think they sound to others.

But ...  I am not naturally a pastoral visiting person, and I know this is my weakest point. It is the thing I would have top of my 'drop list' when time and energy are squeezed. And because of that it is also where my conscience is most vulnerable to criticism, because it lands on my own self criticisms so it is a double whammy right where I have least objectivity and perspective.

I will visit, and she will get over her disappointment that it has taken so long, and the sun will rise and set and the days go on.  And when I am not tired from having been out all day for last 3 days I will not get weepy over a 'just so you know' email.

For now, it is a stiff drink and bed. Tomorrow is another day.

Guilty as charged

I have a guilt problem, it attacks me in lots of ways. Today it bit hard at the end of my assessment meeting with the clinical psychologist. She arranged for a follow up next week to discuss options for support and treatment, but was very open that whatever is decided there would be a waiting list of 3 months at least. She noted that churches often have resources that would enable me to access support sooner.

I know about that, a confidential access to counselling for church ministers, the minister pays part and the Methodist church pays the rest, but without knowing who it is for.  So why have I not gone down that road?  I feel very self conscious that when I crashed at college the church paid to hold me in college for longer and for the weekly counselling I had then – I don’t want to be more of a burden and would feel guilty about taking more. But on the other hand I also feel guilty at clogging the queue in an overstretched NHS service.

The end result of this double guilt effect that her question had unwittingly highlighted was driving home with a feeling that I shouldn’t bother either system and that if I can just get my own act together, well I don’t really need....  Which all essentially equals ‘I’m not worth anyone bothering to invest all that stuff on’ – which is what she had drawn out of our conversation anyway... 

So there you have it – guilty as charged.

Detective Guilt?

Midsomer Murders have been at it for years, but in an Agatha Christie lots of bodies, fixed group of suspects and all neatly sorted in the end style. Reasonable entertainment for those of us who like that kind of thing but still fantastical.  In the last week or so we have had Mayday, the start of Broadchurch and now Shetland – all dramas about small communities in the eye of tragic storms that sweep them into the glare of police and media. 

With our own community in the midst of a critical stage of our own experience of that storm, a storm that began a bit over a year ago, it all feels a bit too close. And yet I have been watching. I am intrigued as I always am by whodunits, but also feel uncomfortable, voyeuristic. The TV shows are fiction, designed to draw us in, ‘no-one was harmed in the making of this movie’ and all that. But in the midst of a murder trial locally, perhaps I am just displacing my feelings about following the local press and keeping up to date with the case.  I can make a defence for it on pastoral grounds – the need to be aware of what may be facing the community from this month long drip, drip of news and stories. But I know that both the curious bit and the detective TV fan in me would be following it anyway and, knowing the real lives that have been impacted in big or small ways, it makes me feel guilty for being interested.

Sometimes the dramas are on the doorstep, and horrible things can happen in idyllic places just as wonderful things can be glimpsed in the most hellish. (What is the opposite of idyllic anyway?) People are people with all our weaknesses and strengths wherever we are, but times like this are a reminder that the picture we show one another can be a long way from the reality behind closed doors, and leave us questioning what we thought we knew.

A ripe context for any drama or novel to gather from, and it seems to be a flourishing harvest at the moment.

Half full or half empty?

I have been getting increasingly anxious about feeling low and the things I haven’t got done because I have been hiding under the duvet instead. Last Friday I was open with my small support group about what I am like when the outside being a minister mask can be put down. With their encouragement I booked to go back to the doctor. I was thinking that there may not be anything much he could do, afterall I know the theory about challenging my thinking, of the benefit of routine, food, exercise and rest in taming the black dog of depression - I just can’t get it to work. In the same way I understand how a bike works and what to do but have never managed to ride one – just to discover different ways of falling over with one!

So made it to see my doctor yesterday, I had listed the bad day feelings so I wouldn’t forget things. He has changed my antidepressants, so it is a week to wean off the old one and then to gradually introduce the new, and he has put me on referral list for a psychologist.  I mentioned my drinking and he asked a few questions but the answers didn’t concern him, so I feel less guilty about that now.

Today I feel better for having spoken about it all.  My doctor had offered a sick note option until the new drugs kick-in, but I feel that I need the fixed points as a focus and a reassurance of the things I can do. So given that I can be flexible around what I do and when I declined the sick note.  Knowing that it was available, that someone recognises that I am struggling and it is not just my laziness or lack of self-will, has changed how I feel today about the things done and not done.

Since I could have been off sick everything I manage to do in life and work is a bonus rather than thinking about the failures and things not done.   This was essentially the idea from the support group – ‘have done’ lists rather than ‘to do’ lists. But with the doctor’s backing I have felt able to send a message to the church stewards to say I will be less than fully functioning for a while yet, and the layers of guilt are falling away. The glass may be incomplete but today I feel it is okay for it to be only part way and I will call it a quarter or a half full instead of focussing on what is missing.

From tears to tiredness

I felt I ought to follow up from last week's emotional splurge.

I knew at the time how out of perspective my response was but it didn't stop me still being weepy next day - and the post sob headache (or was that the wine?) Cue more feelings of inadequacy when I wimped out of the people stuff I had intended for the day. But big emotional reactions are tiring, they take up a lot of energy reserves. 

I had a really positive end of the week with a conversation about a new family and youth friendly approach to church. Then the first 'dare to debate' on end of life choices - and I wasn't alone, it was a small group but an in depth conversation. Throw in Sunday and I have stayed in bed most of today again. 

The tiredness eats into my time and, in a world that values productivity and busyness, that makes me self-conscious about not working as I 'should' yet when I look back over the weekend I am reminded that God takes and uses me as I am. But I still manage to feel guilty...

The little child inside that cried last week still fears that I will be considered unable to do this job, as was suggested back in college days in the depth of my breakdown. And despite all the affirmations since then I still have that fear and doubt which feeds moments like last week, and the guilt when my body demands extra rest.

This week my diary is thin in must do's, maybe my challenge is to attempt to rest guilt free - I don't even have a sermon to do as it is my sunday off this week.

Allsorts day

My blood tests came back normal for B12 – I was disappointed. That may sound odd but there is a lot of logic to it. It is not a wish to have a problem, but a wish to have something fixable. Though objectively measurable would be good too.  From chronic fatigue to depression I am fed up with subjective conditions. Other people can see the effects but no-one can measure the good day or the bad day, or even the bad day coped with well bluffing people into thinking it’s a good day. That leaves the pressure on me to balance my own care, yet I can’t necessarily do that.

When I am low but not totally crashed out the boundaries are all blurred. Is my hiding under the duvet typing this* because the house is cold and I’m a miser, or because  I can’t face the big wide world and it’s my safe zone– security blanket effect, or because I am tired and want to be horizontal?  It is partly a mix of all of those, with a dash of bad habits becoming engrained, but in any one day the proportions vary.

But if I am feeling the depression then I am also likely to be beating myself up with guilt, and so likely to accuse myself of bad habit laziness for my lack of proper eating, housework and general life stuff, let alone work and especially avoiding people because I can’t face the world.  So does that mean that the more I blame laziness and bad habits then the deeper my depression is? But sometimes it will be habit and laziness, and bad behaviour like watching iplayer after midnight which will leave me overtired next day.

This morning I saw someone on an overdue visit and survived, enjoyed her stories of long ago, and left wracked with guilt that I had let myself put off the visit, this afternoon I went to see someone who had asked me at church to call because she wanted a chat. All week I had been dreading it and still was. Why? I think it was because she isn’t the sort of person to feel a need of me for a there, there care visit, and she will state her mind quite firmly about issues. Add in my own guilt about visits not made....

I braced myself at the doorstep as if I was at the head teacher’s door. And it turned out that she was offering to help out, that she wanted to do something useful with her time and lots she couldn’t do but she can get around in the car and can listen and chat. In their village chapel there is not currently any folk stuck at home but she could help in other places if I could use her. I was reduced to tears at the offer as the neighbouring church has so many in need of regular visits, and so few left to visit. 

She affirmed me in my role as a minister despite the guilt I confessed to feeling about avoiding visits when my depression sends me under the duvet too often.  She reminded me that God knew my strengths and weaknesses when he called me to this – and called me as that person. Theoretically I know that but being reminded by someone else is precious, and in an unexpected moment when the guilt was high and I really needed it.  

* about 5pm in draft

Heads you win, tails I lose

I seem to be ploughing the same furrows at the moment, the temptation and guilt of ‘tomorrow’,  facing up to tasks...  Well today started with yet another failure to get going followed by a lot of phone calls to try and sort out some important stuff – which should have been done earlier.

I finally got determined enough to say that there was time to do some of the visits I had hoped to bite the bullet and do.  I should I suppose being looking that as a positive thing – not using the excuse that most of the day was already written off and I have a meeting to prepare for in the evening.  Instead I came back feeling worse than ever, heart aching with the reminder of why they and everyone else didn’t deserve to be sidelined.

This job is full of things that won’t get done, the difference is whether you are confident that you have done the best you could or not.  And right now I don’t feel I have given my best, I think of the times when I let time seep away, when I let my inertia stop me calling in for half an hour with someone, or even just a brief phone call.

Yet I have days when I just don’t have any social energy, days when even making a phone call seems beyond me (I am a lot better than I used to be but still have a dose of phone phobia at the best of time).  Or am I just using my depression as an excuse? Would I say that if it was my body more than my spirit, if it was regular migraines or sickness?  And yet I know plenty of people who work despite aching arms and legs.

At what stage do you going from fighting to carry on despite the pain and deciding you need to crawl into bed and rest? And when the illness affects your decision making and motivation how can you tell which is right?

 And so tonight I feel that I have let people down, and wonder if I am up to it all.  Or is that just the Depression Dog barking and creating havoc?

Why I only almost called to see you today...

Ok, so I need to confess what I am putting off until tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow...

Is it depression or just part of the range of 'normal' I don't know, but once I have failed to do something I find it so much harder to go back and begin again.

Pastoral visits are part of that.  It has been a busy summer, I went off to ordination, came back to some serious issues and people that needed support in that moment. The routine visits have drifted and although I know why, and that I only have so much to offer, I still feel guilty. And I have no excuses to offer for the fact I haven't been to see you for so long, well none that I can share to explain.

All the more reason to catch up with visits now, or as soon as I can, but it is such a huge thing to step back over the threshold.  There is a kernel of shame and embarrassment that I - and as a representative of the church as well - have let you down, and the next time I meet you face to face I have to confront all those emotions. 

And that can feel too big to face, and so tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow...

I know it is not rational, I know that you will probably be simply glad to see me, and graciously accepting that I have a busy life (though I will know I could have called last week if I had the courage to face my guilt, and that just adds another layer).

And if I feel this way about visiting you, how many feel this way about visiting God again after so long away?

The tyranny of Tomorrow

‘Tomorrow, tomorrow, I’ll love you tomorrow’ so sings orphan Annie in the musical.

Tomorrow is not a day, it is an idea. It is an excuse. I’ll do my homework tomorrow, I’ll join the gym tomorrow, the diet starts tomorrow, tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. But tomorrow never comes, there is always another tomorrow to pass the buck to.

This week I have cleared the build up of work chaos scattered around the house and rehomed it in the study, the craft in the hobby room and rediscovered areas of floor and table around the house.  It is September the start of the Methodist year and a fresh new set of paperwork and meetings to face so an ideal time to get the filing ready for a fresh start. But just like every year in the job so far I find myself promising myself that this time I really will Get Organised and not have to fight the rearguard action all the time. 

Tomorrow I will be organised. Tomorrow I will be a better minister. From tomorrow I will do x, y and z that I have failed on so often before.

Tomorrow is one of those dangerous ideas, like oughts and shoulds.  A mixture of guilt and a committed pledge – but one that will not be fulfilled, and because we know that we push it onto tomorrow. By doing that we pretend that we are ready to turn over a new leaf and try to put off the guilt of failure to another day.

Depression seems to swing between the horrors of yesterday (only the bad stuff gets remembered) and guilt of tomorrows needing to be faced but looking so far out of reach. Living in the moment for the moment is such a gift.

Putting on your own oxygen mask first...

... or Why I shouldn't feel guilty about things not done.

But I do.  I was away for 2 weeks for ordination and the Methodist Conference, I came back tired and allowed myself a gentle week, then things blew up - important things that I needed to focus on. And so the routine visits, important but not urgent, were set aside. Then it was Holiday Club week - filling my time with prep and action.  But that was last week, this week was supposed to be about catching up with people, it is Friday and I have just about managed to look after myself.

My depression has bitten back - partly a reaction to some stresses, partly because in the midst of that I foolishly missed my meds for a few days, and now experiencing the chemical dip.

It is a bit like flood watch on a sunny day - a strange feeling event in the town a couple of weeks ago when we were waiting to see if the previous weather, and pressures from upstream would overflow the riverbank, and yet it was a gloriously sunny dry day when the sandbags and defences were going up. It felt incongruous, and yet was entirely logical.

The same is true of my moods this week, I feel guilty because there isn't much to feel stressed or hassled about this week, but the effects of previous weeks still flow down the line.  I feel guilty because those I need to visit have more cause to feel low than I do, and because it is not just this week, but that more than a month has passed without catching up with people that I was already overdue seeing.

I feel guilty because in my low mood I am afraid that I am going to drift into my fear of visiting, my fear of inadequacy. I have done some out and about stuff, and had the film show at one church yesterday - only the fixed expectation got me there, this afternoon I have another plus a planned baptism visit to a family afterwards.  Again my mood and instinct is to go hide under the duvet, my brain is fidgety and the wider world feels too big and scary.

Jumping but which way?

A couple of posts ago I spoke about the frogs in the garden who jumped further into the long grass to escape the mower, although the safer space was actually out in the open where my mower was not going to attack any further.

I am a frog.

Today I feel vulnerable, because of a stressful time just over a week ago when I missed several doses of meds in a row, now my levels are low and the crushing lowness and inabilibity to face the outside world is kicking in big time.

Like the frogs I want to hide in the long grass, hiding in a drink that numbs the ache, but that is no good for me in the long run.  I also feel guilty that as far as my role as a minister is concerned I am well overdue a whole heap of visits to folk.  I know why I have been unable to catch up with them over recent hectic weeks, but now I have the time - however I am not there in person only in body. Should I make the effort to offer the bit of me that is available, or care for myself first so that I am fit and well in future weeks? I know that it should be the latter but feel that others would expect the first and feel guilty.

Feeling guilty but hiding at home with some admin, not facing people. I did make myself turn up for a 'not-coffee' with a friend which was hard to do but worth it once there. Then I dashed into the next town for library and co-op visit. I returned to the car with relief and needing deep breaths before I could head home. Not yet ready to give to others in a visit, and managed to send email note out to church stewards to say I am off on leave next week, but fragile this week so sorry if don't get done all I should/want to. 

A big step. 

Maybe I can jump out into the open grass after all. 

And as the meds blip passes all will be well, all manner of things will be well...