A week since...

... I realised that I needed to seriously consider time off, that I was not ready to go back to work after my holiday leave.

In that week I have -
1) crossed wires with my boss who was disappointed that I hadn't told him that I was struggling before Christmas. His role is one of care for colleagues - it is different to say your manager in the office, although even there they are supposed to be able to respond to personal issues, but probably only when it gets to affect your actual work. I had shared with colleagues nearer to me after all.
2) had a really useful doctor's review, changed meds and received orders to go to the gym
3) officially signed off work for 3 weeks
4) signed up for the gym, and been back since!
5) slept lots but not always at night
6) begun to face up to being not the superwoman who can still do stuff despite depressive waves, but being fragile in my wobbles. Only begun though, lots more to do there.

So quite a full week considering.

And today? Well a call last night from the tenant of my flat (well the bank's flat) that the electric shower has died, so I thought I would face a day of chasing things up, but in the end one phonecall to the local electrical firm and now I sit and wait for them to visit and send me a quote. So the morning was in bed with iplayer type telly rather than dashing arond which was good. My legs were also feeling tired from the gym yesterday, and it was according to The Plan a salsa DVD day which I finally got to before tea. Useless, I can't co-ordinate to follow it!  I didn't have to think with the treadmill yesterday, just keep going.

I am also planning to break my leave tomorrow - an opportunity to speak to a high school RE class, this is a new thing and true to my need to be in control I couldn't find it in me to cancel this bit of my diary. I had the plan for what I was doing so no big prep stress, although I have just had an email from the teacher to say the school are dealing with a tragedy, so I may well offer to stay around if that is any use to them. (A bit of a Rev moment when a routine school assembly becames more profound - though unfortunately not watchable at the moment)

In part I would say that it may turn out to be very timely that I - as someone not a staff member - can be around if people need to talk.  Or is that another symptom alongside not being willing to cancel the class visit, that shows my need to be a fixer and a doer, and letting my projects and opportunities become my special babies I am not good at letting go of.

But those are deep thoughts for another day, for today the fact is that it is 10pm and no sign of the queasiness, enough tiredness to sleep when I go to bed, and I didn't have the new shower stress I feared, so a good day.

On the sick...

Ok, so I went to the doctors’ on Friday, and being a drop in appointment I got whoever was available, which a doctor I had not seen before (and relatively new to the team).  When I arrived in the area and signed up with the practice I had already been on Citalopram for a year, and other than when they upped my dose in the early months of the job there has been no review of my condition. I went myself at various times to review and it was just a case of ‘I’m managing ok but still have wobbly days’, ‘ok so carry on’.

So it was a shock to find – having dragged myself there and waited – that I was being asked for details about my condition, about possible triggers for the downturn etc. Initially I felt defensive and wished he would just give me the sick note and let me go home.  But the truth is that for the first time in years I feel I have a doctor who is interested in my condition.  He has changed my meds to Fluoxetine (Prozac) after saying that my higher dose citalopram should be giving me a better base line than I was describing, so if it wasn’t then it can’t be working as hoped.

He signed me off for 3 weeks, and ordered me to exercise everyday – enough to get heart pumping. Hmm less sure on that one, but as I have to go back in 3 weeks and am not good at missing homework excuses (always was a compliant swot) I will probably try.

Rest of Friday was taken up with looking at the diary and confirming what needs cover and who needs to be told I won’t be at events/meetings. A visit from a colleague to see how I am, and to pass on work info then flop to bed where I stayed all through Saturday.

So its Sunday, and pushed myself to get up and walk over to the leisure centre to find out about costs etc. I went during service time so I wouldn’t bump into any church folk – turns out that for all I have said about being happy to be open about having depression, that only applies when I can be seen to be successfully managing it. Being on sick leave feels like a failure of sorts – yet rationally I know that acknowledging my need for it is a positive thing.  Emotions are such complicated things.

Analyse that.....

With Christmas still drifting in our ears, Iam reminded that 'Mary pondered these things in her heart'. Well I do more than ponder them, I analyse things, read into them, read out of them, all looking for the terrible worst case options.

With the therapy that came with my breakdown a number of years ago we discussed this level of paranoia, and the need to analyse for fear of something awful.  I thought I had it largely under control, but when I am low - up it pops with full force.

Today for example - it is the end of my official holiday leave, and I have had to face up to the fact that I am not ready to go back to work. If it were not for the holiday I would have faced this a couple of weeks ago. So I contacted some of the relevant people by email and since then it has all gone haywire.

Ok so the end result is that I will drag myself from my bed to go to the doctors for a note tomorrow and everyone is fine about me taking a couple of weeks off despite the hassle for others covering my sunday appointments at short notice.

But the way there was via some misunderstandings, and my huge emotional reaction to what I thought was being said. And it is scary to find how active some of those old buttons I thought we had disarmed can be. They have been triggered with such force that I couldn't see anything but those fears in what I read. I read not concern for me but a worry that I am not coping with the job as a whole. In college when the breakdown hit there was reason to think that 'they' would never let me be a minister, and suddenly I find that after a couple of years with no crises either in the job or in my depression, and objectively no reason to question my long term capability, the fear of being shut down is still so acute.

It is scary to find that in low times I am really as fragile as ever. Perhaps the point is that we are never made less fragile in our core - but when well we have more layers of bubble wrap to absorb the knocks of life. And the past few weeks burst my last few bubbles and I just have limp plastic around my weaknesses.

So right now I am dealing with the shock of how vulnerable I am at the moment, whilst tying myself in knots about how I reacted to emails and phone conversations today, where it all went wrong, and what people will think of me etc.

And I need to be more real about myself - I talk the talk of openness about my life with depression and fighting the stigma, but to need to actually take time off work, that feels like failure. But failure of what? Failure to be the superhero who can manage life and ministry with depression.  Hello reality!