Or rather an ageing, drunk, bottle neck blues player saved my life, how you wonder why? Well now that I’m feeling a bit more alert and slightly less frail I’ll explain.
After I went to bed on Thursday and after I wrote my last blog post I was still distraught following the events of that evening. Meanwhile my partner and Magpie’s husband J carried on drinking and talking. Whilst they were oblivious to my state I called my local crisis team as I was feeling suicidal, I had more or less planned it in my head. After speaking to the lady from the crisis team I didn’t feel much better and I laid in wait for J to go home and my partner to fall into a deep drunken sleep to go downstairs and carry out my plan. Eventually at about 3am J went home and my boyfriend came to bed, be warned, when he’s had a few drinks he turns into a nasty red-eyed monster and started shouting at me for no particular reason, after a bit of vile ranting blaming the world’s ills on me he went to sleep and started to snore loudly. Time to put my plan into action. 4am brought knocking on the door, I went downstairs as I had an idea that it would probably be a drunken and upset J, it was “I can’t find my keys” he turned out his pockets, we searched the lounge looking underneath all the cushions, no keys to be found, I bundled him off to the spare room and told him we’d have another look in the morning. Half an hour later I’m woken up again, “I can’t sleep, I’ve got to find my keys” this time we follow his steps back to his house and find no keys. This palaver has woken up my boyfriend and we drag him back indoors and back to bed. So with the stereo snoring, snoring in bed next to me, and snoring coming from the spare room I put in my earplugs and finally drift off to sleep. Another knock on the door, it’s 8.30am it’s one of my neighbours “Cat, I’m worried, J’s front door is wide open and Ursa (J’s alsation-labrador cross) is going nuts in the front garden and I don’t want to go near her, she knows you and I’ve got to go to work.” Awful scenarios run through my mind, mainly the worry that somebody’s broken into his house, and then I notice that J has escaped through the kitchen door which was locked. I approach his house with in trepidation and sure enough Ursa is her usual loud, over excited self. I find J slumped in his chair jabbering away to himself, I’m relieved and annoyed at the same time, I feed the dog and give J a stern talking too, then go home back to bed and have a restful sleep with a strange time-travelling dream.
When you’re depressed mornings are the worst, I dragged my suicidal self up and forced myself to make a cup of tea and take my meds. Another knock on the door. It’s an apologetic J, with some interesting but impossible theories that he thinks will help him cope with his grief. We agree that a trip to Bedworth might do us some good, for me to see somebody from the mental health team and for him to have some lunch, fresh air and sunshine.
A bit later on after I’ve managed to shower and dress myself we get to Bedworth and I’m seen by a CPN (community psychiatric nurse) which I find quite helpful, to talk through some of the issues that I’ve been dealing with and ways of moving forward, I’m given some numbers and he’s referred me to have a advocate to help me with stuff, he’ll call my disability employment advisor at the Jobcentre and talk to psychiatrist also about having a CPN. I feel a bit more positive, I still feel as though I don’t want to be alone, I still feel as though something small could tip me over the edge. I’ve managed to some more laundry, the washing up and hovered the lounge; I still need to finish my response to the Personal Independence Payment Assessment Criteria, so I best get on with it.
