It’s Saturday 19th at 11.25 as I start this and I’m just sort of waffling on really, and if you have read my posts you may say that I do that anyway 🙂
I hurt my back a couple of weeks ago, and it isn’t too good. I am having to stand up
to write this with my laptop on a small footstool on the dining room table, with a hot water bottle strapped into my belt, but such is life. Give me a bad back or bad anxiety and a bad back wins every time!
I mentioned medication because of my mood swings, and to be honest, taking the medication is helping me, that doesn’t mean of course that it will help everyone as we are all different, but it is helping me. And with the medication I was given for my back, I am starting to rattle when I walk.
I mentioned looking for help if you are struggling with any form of MHI, and that is exactly what I did. Not so much because of my anxiety, but the mood swings that had started to appear which I assumed had stemmed from my anxiety. I had a good chat with my doctor and the decision was made, and as previously mentioned it is working and I would gladly stay on this medication for some time if it means I don’t have the lows I had. They were horrible places to be, the highs are not as high as they were but I’ll settle for that. Consistence moods are good!
But it proves that help is there and it comes in many forms and we can’t be scared to ask. I held back, maybe not scared just a little apprehensive because I think I knew that medication was the next step, and it is not one of my preferences, even for a sore head.
And then there is the stigma attached to it too. Imagine talking to people and openly saying ‘I take anti-depressants.’ Some people’s response would at the least be raised eyebrows. But no-one other than you and your doctor needs to know. Not parents, (although for younger people I’d suggest speaking to them about it, being middle-aged I decided mine didn’t need to know), not friends, not work colleagues – No-one. So why not if that is what is needed to help, my opinion is to at least talk to someone. Please!
On the subject of people knowing, I know two people who were very good friends
while working for the same company. They both left at the same time and unfortunately one of them, who had suffered previously with anxiety, suffered again and had a month away at her parents to get away and relax.
Her friend, then never contacted her because he couldn’t deal with what she was going through and that is a shame, but it shows how these conditions can affect people in different ways. I saw them working together and their camaraderie was good to see and hear, proper works relationships, proper work banter with laughs along the way. Yet when anxiety is introduced to the relationship it falls apart and that is a shame. Its no-ones fault, it is life, but again it shows how this and probably other MHI’s affect people in different ways. After all if we were all the same when suffering I’m sure a cure would have been found by now!
The Corona Virus Pandemic has been and still is a strange thing and it is probably having a bigger effect on our lives than we expected. There have been some peculiar sightings and stories, such as the guy in our local town, who stands on the high street with a placard telling us to ‘respect our face, and don’t wear a mask.’ I was going to put my mask on and stop and speak to him to ask what his opinions and thoughts were but my wife dragged me away!
What do I think, well, to be honest, I don’t really know? We hear so many different stories I don’t think we know what to believe, we see and hear of Government U-turns and I ask what the decision process was in the first place, the same as I don’t understand why we now have quarantine guidelines in place when we return from certain countries, yet we didn’t close the borders when it all first started. Something that I thought was a natural and obvious thing to do (except for returning UK citizens that is). Why let people come into our country that may be infected, especially with no controls in place. To me in my logical little world an obvious way for the virus to spread, and again we cannot monitor everyone that comes over our Borders – it’s impossible. But then when High Street establishments let their employee’s come back from Spain and only self-quarantine for a few days before getting them back to work so the shop manager can go on holiday, what chance do we have. And on that note, I will point you to my post.
I’ll never know, as I’m not being invited to sit with our leaders and be allowed to ask questions, or certainly question their decision making, something I’d like to do just to hear their logic and why they chose to do what they do, and say what they say.
We are now hearing that local lockdowns are taking place with pubs having to close earlier, yet SOME pubs still don’t take track and trace information, don’t monitor one
way systems or any systems, staff don’t wear face coverings, and many people don’t socially distance, and the same could be said for shops. Have a local lockdown, but we will keep two types of establishments open where there is more chance of people congregating. I won’t go into the protests and beaches. After all closing at 10.00 or 11.00 means people will simply go out earlier, they still want to drink!! But don’t get me started on establishment employee’s not wearing face coverings, or wearing those that won’t stop the employee spreading the virus should they have it, God forbid. That is covered in the letter to Mum and Dad as well!
While on the subjects of pubs, you may know we have recently come back from a week in Cornwall, and a much-needed break it was too. We used the same pub every day in the small village of Boscastle and when we left we said goodbye to the people we had come to know. Being good there was the now-familiar ‘fist bump’ as a gesture of contact when we said those goodbyes, except that was for one barman who refused, not the contact, but the fist bump. He insisted on holding his hand out for a handshake, which for the first time in many months I gave into. The ironic thing? He was the youngest of the four we said goodby to, not yet in his thirties!!
But as well as the Government, I don’t understand a lot of things about that is going on, and that is on a daily basis, give me the information and I will give you an opinion, and I’d love to be on the committee that makes the decisions for sure, but if someone gave me the opportunity to stay at the age I am but to go back to living some forty years ago, I’d bite their hand off!
Thank you for reading and stay safe