Trivial tales from someone who’s always in it

Back again … and after only three months. Time flies when you’re mental.

So, in order that we can finally begin to think about moving on, here it is … the first of the last of the milestones. Praise Jesus and praise all the cute little ornaments on His holy shelves.

To expedite matters and to atone for being too lazy to sign up for NaNoWriMo this year, I will attempt to post one whole milestone a day until they’re finished. And they will finish.

Yes they will.

Milestone #6:
I’m a bit embarrassed about this one, given how scathing I’ve been in the past about people who believe that “The Universe” gives a shit about them and their lives (I can’t link to any examples because they were written in a blogger format that’s incompatible, so you’ll just have to trust me on this). But here it is anyway:

I was out walking the dog one morning, about six weeks after I’d left work, when I was suddenly overtaken by An Urge. This wasn’t your common, garden-variety urge, like suddenly wanting to play all of your DVDs featuring James McAvoy really, really slowly and imagining what it would be like if it was you he was pashing instead of that skank on the screen. No, this was more along the lines of: The Urge To Address Something Up In The Sky.

I don’t know what the Something Up In The Sky that I wanted to address actually was. I only know what it wasn’t. It wasn’t a cloud or a bird or a plane or argon (my favourite inert gas). It wasn’t God, The Universe or any dead people I know. It wasn’t one of those floaty things on my eyes that I see when I look at a white wall. It was just a Something, and instinctively I knew that for one-sided conversation purposes, it was to be found Up In The Sky.

So I raised mine eyes to the heavens and said (out loud, because you can get away with that when you’re mental), “Well, that’s it. Everything’s totally up in the air now, so it’s up to you how it all falls  … because I don’t have a fucking clue what I’m supposed to do next.”

Maybe my conscious was talking to my subconscious, I dunno. The obvious answer would be to shoot me up with a shit-load of LSD and dump me into a sensory-deprivation tank monitored by a barking-mad scientiest so that I can find out, just like they did to that blonde chick in every second episode of Season One of Fringe. Standard practice whenever there’s a niggling little question in the back of one’s mind, I would’ve thought.

Anyway, that’s it, really. Nothing happened. I didn’t get any kind of revelation from the process; just felt a bit stupid and embarrassed …

Until a fortnight later, when the revelation did come. And nothing’s been the same since.

Til tomorrow.

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Milestone #3 in Your Correspondent’s recovery from being mental was a very long time in the making. Fourteen years, to be exact. That’s how long ago I was diagnosed with depression. No matter how often and by whom it was suggested, I’ve always resisted all forms of counselling and therapy. Didn’t want it, didn’t trust it and was way too proud to consider anyone else might have something valuable to say where my life or the workings of my head were concerned.

It was those bloody radio awards that changed everything. (Didn’t win, didn’t expect to, wasn’t bothered.) Just when I was starting to feel I was calming down and getting a measure of control back over my state of mind, the finalists were announced and I went immediately into an epic tail-spin. I wanted to be back at work. All my symptoms returned, including the awful, debilitating grief at leaving. In the end, I thought, You really need to do something about this. It’s doing your head in. You’ll end up in even more of a mess unless you can find a way to think about everything that’s happened and put it into some sort of context.

That’s how I found myself on a phone, pouring out my story to a Psychologist Called Keith.

The Psychologist Called Keith was a very nice man with some very interesting things to say. Here are a couple:

PCK:  Do you know why this has happened to you?
Niki: Um … because I’m a headcase?
PCK: Because you went back to work too soon after your cancer treatment. You didn’t give yourself any time to deal with the physical and emotional trauma that goes with it. If I was your oncologist, I would’ve hit the roof when I found out how quickly you went back. I think the only reason you got away with it was that he’s in Perth and you’re 1600 kilometres away in Karratha and you only see each other every six months. As for your former employer, in my opinion, you’ve got a good case against the organisation for negligence.
Niki: Whoa, hang on a minute. No-one held a gun to my head. It was my decision to go back when I did.
PCK: Oh, and you were thinking clearly at the time, were you? I don’t think so.

I’m not the litigious type. Ask my ex-husbands. But I have since pondered those words. Organisations are very quick to demand medical certificates for sick leave but how many of them ask for medical certification that you’re fit to return … particularly when you’ve had a serious illness?

The Psychologist Called Keith went on to say that in view of the circumstances, it was inevitable I would crash; it was just a matter of when. He voiced surprise that I held it together for as long as I did. He said many people wouldn’t be able to handle the stress of my job on its own, let alone everything else that had gone on in the last three years. He reminded me that despite the other stuff going on my life, I’d still put myself at the top of my game, as evidenced by the radio award finals. He explained what was behind some puzzling behaviour from other people. He finished by telling me I was going to be fine, that I should turn around any negative feelings I had and use them for something positive and the most important thing I could do was:

PCK: Hold on to that wonderful sense of humour you’ve got. That sense of humour will save your life.

He surprised me. I wasn’t expecting him to be so supportive. I thought he was going to point out everything about my thought processes and my psyche that made me weak and pathetic and unable to function. I didn’t expect him to be on my side. And, for the record, I didn’t make myself out to be any sort of hero or better than I am. If you’re wanting someone’s help, you don’t fuck around with the facts.

I’m glad I spoke to the Psychologist Called Keith. He gave me some perspective. I don’t know if I’ll ever need to talk to someone like him again but if I do, I won’t hesitate. And you shouldn’t either, if you need to.

As for Milestone #4 … well, you know about that one. You might’ve read it. It was the “Breaking up is hard to do” post.

I’d had a few weeks to digest everything the Psychologist Called Keith said and decided it was time to write it all down and see what I really thought. I was quite proud of that post, in the end. I thought it showed I was taking responsibility for my own actions and facing up to the consequences.

However, not everyone liked it as much as I did. About a week after I published it, I had a phone call from someone in the organisation where I used to work. Let’s just say that this call wasn’t motivated by any concern for my welfare and it certainly didn’t speed up my recovery. After the initial shock, I got quite upset. And after that, I got angry. Very angry indeed. For a long time.

But who wants to be continuously angry? It’s poisonous. You have no idea the relief I felt when one day, I found myself thinking, Fuck it. Who gives a shit? It’s all bollocks. I understood that I was over it. Simple as that. So I moved on. As Tim Winton says in Breath: People are fools, not monsters.

Maybe that was Milestone #5.

Anyway, not much more to go. There are only two or three milestones left and they’re good ones.  Then let’s see if I can still make us laugh. I’m looking forward to that.

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 When bad things happen in my life, I tend not to write about them on the blog. The less you read about them, the worse they’ve been. Over the years, I’ve mentioned being depressed a few times but I’ve never elaborated on how crippling those periods were. Witnessing the death of my sister-in-law three years ago was summed up by one line in a very short post. That’s because for months afterwards, I couldn’t sleep. I’d sit up for hours, crying uncontrollably and screaming into a pillow. It was a terrible time.

The cancer thing got a bit more blog coverage. Not because it was an easier process; far from it. But I wanted to put something down about it because I was scared I was going to die. I thought I should make some effort to show how brave and full of raffish good humour I was, despite being terrified by my own mortality. Something for posterity. For the record.

So, the fact that this is only the third post since my “breakdown” back in February should give you some idea of what it’s been like.

For the first month, I was basically suicidal. Or part of me was. Every morning, I’d wake up freaking out at the thought of the radio show I didn’t have any stories lined up for. Then, once I remembered that I no longer worked there, the voice would kick in:

What are you bothering to get up for? You’ll never do anything again in your life as cool as talking on the radio. You may as well end it right here and now because that was as good as it’s ever going to get. You’d be better off dead … 

It was nasty and persuasive. It sat on my chest and pinned me to the bed. It was so loud I couldn’t concentrate on formulating rebuttals. Obviously, I didn’t act on it. But this dark part of my psyche wasn’t going to give up easily.

One of the worst aspects of having a panic attack is the fear you’ll have another one. It’s very fucking frightening to feel that something else has complete control of your body. After my experience on the day I left work, I was afraid of going anywhere because the compulsion to drive into oncoming traffic was so strong. It wasn’t quite a voice but it was more than just an urge. It was something in between and it went like this:

It: Go on, just steer over to the right a bit.
Me: But I’ll kill myself.
It: (playfully, wheedling) Doesn’t matter.

On and on and on … for the whole journey.

Then there were the arguments when approaching roundabouts:

It: No, don’t slow down. Speed up!
Me: But if I don’t give way, I”ll get hit.
It: Just speed up a little. Nothing too serious. Just enough to land up in hospital and have a rest for a while. Then you won’t be in trouble for anything and people will have to be nice to you.

It sounds simplistic but I got through all this by filling up every minute of every day with things to do: walk the dog, do the housework, cook up and freeze lunches for the Dreamboat, bake, iron, knit, work out. I’d make long lists and then cross off each task when I completed it. I only drove twice a week to the supermarket, early in the morning when there weren’t many vehicles about.

Finally, there came the morning when I challenged the “you’ll never do anything that cool again” voice.

Me: Cool in whose eyes?
It: Everyone else’s.
Me: No-one else gives a shit. Cool in whose eyes?
It: Your own.
Me: Yeah. My own. Exactly.

That was the day I began to get better. It was my first milestone.

The second milestone came a couple of days later, during a phone conversation with a friend. I had this sudden realisation; a literal bolt from the blue. I knew I no longer needed an audience. It didn’t matter any more. I didn’t care if no-one knows who I am or what I think about or how I spend my time.

Anyone who’s ever had a front-line job in the media will tell you how hard it is to leave the limelight. I’ve known people who’ve done it and never got over it. You’re a performer and an authority and a personality and, if you’re lucky, more people like you and respect you and look up to you than not, and it’s all very satisfying for the ego. So realising that you’ve let it go and you’ll no longer actively seek it out is a very big deal.

That was when I nearly shut down hot water for good. But hey … even though this blog initially started out as something I did for whoever was interested in reading it, that’s changed over time too. Now, I write it first and foremost for me. And while I appreciate you loyal and long-suffering superheroes who persist in coming back every time I update and who give me so much encouragement and kind thoughts, I’d still blog even if there was no-one coming to visit.

So, now you know a little of what went on in the first couple of months. There are more milestones. There could be a happy ending. Maybe, somewhere down the track,  there might even be a return to humour. I think so. Just bear with me. There are a few other bits to get through first.

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So, that was a little longer between posts than I’d originally intended. Sorry. Stuff has been happening. Stuff of an un-fun nature, about which I don’t want to say a hell of a lot. This is meant to be a humourous blog, after all. (Remember back in the days when this was a humourous blog? Really? Do ya? Go to the archives and check out 2004. Ignore January.)

But I will say this (and I want you to pay close attention because your welfare is my concern):

Never, never, never put your job before everything else in your life. Do not. I don’t care how much you love it. I don’t care that you believe it was the job you were put on this earth to do. If your job is worthwhile and benefits the human race or a small part thereof, and makes you feel all warm and fuzzy … I’m still not caring. Do not put it first. Because when you burn out (and believe me, you will), and yet still keep going (because, let’s face it, you’re an idiot), one of two things will happen:

1. You will have a complete breakdown (this didn’t happen to me).
2. When you’re still approximately two bad days away from a complete breakdown, your body will take matters into its own hands and give you a warning in the form of the mother of all panic attacks while you’re at work (this did happen to me). You find yourself walking out the door, getting into your car and driving home, all the time screaming inside at yourself and trying to ignore the little voice that’s telling you to drive headlong at speed into oncoming traffic.

And here’s the outcome, tidily summarised for you in a convenient, arrow-pointed list:

• You turn into a shaking, crying, terrified wreck every time you even think about your workplace (this lasted a month).
• Your brain shuts down whenever anything to do with your workplace comes up, so that five minutes after you’ve had a phone conversation with someone work-related, you can’t remember anything they said (so did this).
• You’re pronounced medically unfit to go back.
• You grieve for your job like a motherfucker because you loved it with all your heart and you still do … but all this other physical, mental and emotional stuff takes over and you have no control over any of it. It’s almost like you’ve developed an allergy (this is still going on, two and a half months after the original attack).
• You finally get to see who your real friends are — especially among your former colleagues — and that, dear superheroes, is perhaps the biggest revelation of them all.

Oh, and here’s the funniest bit. This bit is just jinky! (I made that word up. Can’t see it catching on.) After two months, you’re starting to feel a little better. You know … not wanting to be dead all the time, starting to contemplate what you might do next, almost beginning to enjoy your freedom … and then you get a phone message, with “some news you’ll just LOVE!”.

The Mornings show you presented, an outside broadcast you presented on location last year and the radio station where you’ve worked for two and a half years (and managed for eight months) have all made the finals of some national awards! Woohoo! “We’re all very proud of you!” Yay! “It’s a shame you won’t be there to collect anything if you win!”

I don’t know if anyone’s ever died from a surfeit of irony in their lives but I’m starting to think I’m a serious contender.

Anyway, before I leave this subject, about which I didn’t want to say “a hell of a lot” (see beginning of the post … yeah, all the way up there near the top of the page), here are a few very special circumstances under which you should never make your job the #1 priority. Yes, you shouldn’t do it anyway, but I can’t emphasise this enough:

1. After you’ve been diagnosed with cancer
2. After a death
3. When there’s something really good on TV
4. Ever

Note that I’m not telling you to leave your job. I’m just saying you shouldn’t put it first. But if a day ever comes when you realise you’ve divorced people for less shit than the amount you’ve eaten at your workplace over the years … then get the fuck out of there. Right now. You have my blessing.

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Your Correspondent lives in the region of Australia that’s solely responsible for keeping the country out of recession. It’s often been described as “the power-house that drives the nation’s economy”. Pretty damned florid and impressive, eh? So I can’t help but wonder why it took three fucking months to get our phone connected.

Oh, there were excuses a-plenty: it rained for eight minutes; the sub-contractors didn’t approve of the site’s feng shui; someone’s dog ate someone’s car keys. There were messages to and from assorted toadies at Telstra. One of them — our Case Manager from Telstra’s “Centre for Customer Experience” or some such wank — had a great time leaving messages on my mobile phone with instructions on how to contact him and then making sure he was never there whenever I tried.

It could be worse. Women still die in childbirth here. I shit you not.

Anyway … now that we actually have phone and internet connections once more: Happy New Year to you.

Lots more to come and I’m sorry to say it won’t be pretty.

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