I had a goods night rest last night, a whole 8 hours although I did suffer from a horrible dream. I died 8 times and each time I was murdered by a different girlfriend!! Ive only had 4 proper relationships so dont know where the other 4 came from!
My morning routine.....my one cup of coffee a day, leaded and with one teaspoon of honey, 30 minutes weight training and then onto the banjo again with Basil Rathbone on the tv. Ive got another bat to do and Ill make sure I go for my regular walk again of at least 5000 steps.
I wrote yesterday about CHIME so I thought I would write what each of those initials means to me personally. Today C for Connectedness. No technical terms or jargon but what I think I have lost and what I need to do to regain that connection. Connectedness. Noun The state of being joined or linked. A feeling of belonging to or having an affinity with a particular person or group.
To be connected is to be in touch with yourself. To realise what and where you are in the natural order of things. Where you stand in the mysterious grand scheme of life. It means staying connected to your surroundings and being grounded. It means staying connected to those things in your life that made you a good person before you became ill. It means staying in touch with you, to remind yourself of who you were and what you should be. Connectedness reminds us to stay connected to our girlfriends and mothers, fathers, children and our best friends. It tells us to stay in touch with our emotions and be connected to our spirituality.
How do I reconnect with myself and my surroundings and my family? Easier said than done! Mental illness doesnt just attack you one day. It is insidious and creeps up on you over the months and years. It changes everything about you. You first start to stop doing the things you love, that are part of you. Your hobbies no longer make you happy so you stop doing them. You become withdrawn and stop talking to your partner, your parents and friends. You become angry because you know you are changing but dont know why and you talk less and less, people regard you as morose and boring. You take no pleasure in anything and withdraw more and more into a world of internal pain and suffering. As you continue on this path the strings that attached you to who you were and to your family and friends becomes thinly stretched. Finally the crisis is reached and those strings, under so much pressure finally snap and you are left adrift. You are no longer who you were. You are no longer connected to friends and family or any of those things that made you who you were. They are all forgotten and dont even figure in your twisted confused thinking. As the depression deepens and the loss of connection grows further and further apart from the things you once loved, you are freed from normality. You do not think of anything but your illness and the illness feeds on your negative thoughts 24 hours a day. There is nothing good to break up those thoughts. Unconnected, you are changed and your sense of self, of identity has gone. This then enables you to carry out horrible acts of withdrawal from people who once loved you and you in turn loved. The strings are broken, youve made people hate you, youve made them forget about you and this allows you to commit the ultimate act of self loathing.
I have written many times before that recovery takes a lot of hard work. When I feel low or feel that the depression is taking hold of me again I force myself to do something. It doesnt have to be anything major, go for a walk read a book or, like me do some writing. I have been reconnecting with my family and friends. I go and visit my mum, I speak to my best friend K again, I go for a drive and see my sister and niece and nephews and Ive started making things as well as taking up the banjo again. I did not break those strings that kept me safe, my illness did that. I am not responsible for losing my girlfriend or my family and friends. My illness did that. I did not change into a horrible person. My illness did that. However I am more than my illness, I am stronger than the illness that nearly took my life. I am beginning to understand how and why I became so desperately ill, and in that understanding I have the beating of it. Those strings that my illness broke cannot be fixed by that same illness. It is my job to do that. With help and knowledge and my own determination I will reattach those strings to the things that made me who I was before I became ill. I believe I have mad a dam good start!
We are all of use born beautiful beings. We are not put on this planet to live a life of misery and in turn cause misery to others. It is easy to forget all of this when life deals you a bad hand. However, it is up to you to keep playing until youve been dealt the winning cards. You may not win the jackpot everytime but you have to be in the game in order to have that chance.
Me at the age of about 4 or 5, 1972 or so.
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