hsphaven

I don’t know how much longer I can keep going like this. I’m constantly in a state of overwhelm/overstimulation. My very body overstimulates me. It buzzes, my pulse pounds, my ears ring, my mind races, and this evening as I sat in a support group I didn’t know if the nearby trains were making the room rumble or if it was my internal vibration/tremor caused by my overdose.

Often I feel on the verge of passing out, but I never do. I’m worn out all the time and constantly in a haze. I’m getting headaches nearly every day now. I want to cry all the time. When I’m not sleeping, I am behind a screen shopping online or checking social media. Every day more and more parcels arrive at the door. Today I was greeted with a pile of about seven parcels. I must be spending at least $1000 a week on clothes and accessories and, in three months, I have spent almost a quarter of my savings. If I keep going like this, in nine months time I will be completely broke.

I don’t know why I’m feeling so run down and getting headaches all the time. I don’t know if it’s because of all the time I spend behind a screen, my sleep issues, the overdose, all the radiation in the air from phone towers, wifi etc., or whether it’s part of a dissociative disorder. Many people with DID get headaches before a switch, or when someone is trying to take control and they’re fighting the switch. I feel like I work really hard to keep a lid on my distress, but something has been taking over me lately and wants people to know what is going on inside. Last night I vented to Facebook:

I’m at a loss of words to express how much I am suffering. My entire fucking life has been one gigantic crescendo, the misery getting louder and louder and more unbearable as the years drag on. I have spent the last 12 years in the mental health system which has been my breaking point. Instead of helping me, these demons dressed up as angels have made me so much worse. I have suffered attachment trauma. I have been left on the floor of a hospital crying, screaming, clawing layers of skin off my arm with my bare nails, banging my head against the wall and wanting to exit the world with no body by my side. I have gone to the hospital distressed and ready to exit the world and turned away, dumped on the floor outside or sent home in a taxi at 4am. I have had a hospital threaten to drag me out using their security despite being ready to wipe myself off this planet and extremely unwell. I have put up with crappy, invalidating comments from mental health “professionals”, my favourite one being “everyone has issues, I have mortgages to pay”. I have suffered many meltdowns because hospitals are still not accessible for people with autism and sensory processing sensitivity. I have been told I’m too sick for the private system, but the public system doesn’t want me either. I have been forcibly given drugs. I have been given drugs that have left me with further issues. I continue to be tormented by a buzzing sensation on my head which was caused by an antidepressant I was given, ironically making me even more depressed. My nervous system is fucked and my pulse pounds from my overdose many months ago which may not have happened if the mental health system wasn’t so negligent. I saw a neurologist who was equally as useless, telling me that my overdose symptoms are all in my head and part of my schizophrenia, a diagnosis which no one can agree on as psychiatry is a quack science and there are no tests. A diagnosis which was based on one ignorant person’s OPINION. I spend my days now just trying to survive. Trying to find a distraction from the discomfort I’m in. But tonight it’s all getting to me. I want to smash a fucking window. I want to end it all. It’s amazing that everything I’ve gone through hasn’t killed me. But sometimes, what doesn’t kill you makes you wish it did. And there is no where to turn as the mental health system is the problem. I have an enormous amount of angry energy which I’m tired of turning in on myself. I think it’s time to tear this institution down and create something else.

I felt incredibly vulnerable making a post like that, and it was hard to sleep that night for many reasons. I had a cardiology appointment that day and they did an echocardiogram (ultrasound of the heart) which was actually quite painful. I asked the technician if he could press a little lighter, but he said he had to press that hard to get the reading. I then had to wear a heart monitor overnight which was uncomfortable. I will have to explain to them that the reading may be a bit odd as I was scared and paranoid that night. I was in a very dark frame of mind and thought someone was breaking into my house at one point, so my heart was racing. Then just as I was about to fall asleep I confronted something very dark in my mind and jolted awake again. This unfortunately has become a common occurrence. I don’t know exactly what it is that I’m confronting, but it is outright demonic. Because of all this I got very broken sleep last night. Tomorrow I have another cardiology appointment for another echocardiogram and I am angry. I want to cancel it. They never sent me a reminder text asking me to confirm the appointment, and I will be asleep all day tomorrow. I feel like just sleeping through it. Everything is so hard, and the world can just go away for a while. I arrived at the appointment on Tuesday late as I was struggling so much. The receptionist said I was late. I told her I “feel like shit”, which was an understatement.

I pushed myself to go to a support group today (for mood disorders and neurodivergence) as my friends were going. It was a bit much. I wanted to break down and cry, and at one point everything felt unreal. I wondered whether anyone had any idea what was happening to me. I was close to walking out at many points. I’m really angry right now. I just am. At just about everything. And I feel some of that anger came through in group. At some points I didn’t really feel like they noticed I was sitting there feeling like it was all a dream and wanting to bawl my eyes out. Towards the end I did get a chance to share, but it was a little late. Another member then started talking about themselves and I felt like the conversation moved away from me too quickly rather than holding space for me. I felt like I was left clutching my heart in my hands. The facilitator did come back to me and wanted to link me in with some services. Other members of the group seemed to really care as well when they realised I was not ok. But when group finished I left immediately, maybe shutting the door a bit too hard on my way out. I climbed up some concrete stairs and wedged myself in a corner. I wanted to hide my face from the world. I felt like catching the train home so I didn’t have to speak with anyone, but my NDIS worker was waiting for me. I ignored her calls. I don’t know how to explain my behaviour today, only that something was taking over me and I had little control over it. I managed to pull myself together and have some dinner with my two friends who I know care about me. They both messaged me after I left, and were wondering if a peer support worker might be better for me rather than more professionals (who they know I’ve had a terrible experience with).

When I got home I was hoping my dad had gone to bed, but I could hear him still up in the back half of the house. He then opened the door dividing the two halves of the house and headed towards me. I quickly shut myself in the study. “Hello Zoe!” he said cheerfully. I just about screamed at him, but managed to assemble a “hello” back, though a very unenthusiastic one. I just wanted to be left alone where I could breathe. I wish I had my own place far away from everyone. He rustled around outside the study at the table in front of the TV. I had to fight all urges to scream at him to go away. Finally he went back to his bedroom. Then he came out again, and I hid in the study again until he left.

I still get the urge to overdose on pills, even though that is what caused the issues which are troubling me so much. I also get the urge to starve myself, exercise and lose lots of weight, even though I am already skinny. I do my best to talk myself out of these urges, but it’s not easy. As for beating my addiction to shopping and the internet, that is going to be even more difficult. Here I am back on the computer again. I’m trying my best not to browse Marketplace and depop at least which is where I’ve been making most of my purchases. I keep feeling like I need to take a holiday or something. A change in environment. Some space to myself. I want to isolate…. I don’t know whether this is healthy or not. A few years ago I stayed on a farm and did some work there which was good for me. But as soon as I came back to the city my health quickly deteriorated. Maybe I need to go back to the farm and perhaps stay there for good, but it is so hard to do anything right now.