Life, later.

It is interesting reading old blogs… like reading old diaries and letters, you see yourself how you were, and sometimes that person is a stranger. Many of the emotions, I felt two and three years ago, I see as so selfish and self indulgent now. I want to shake my slightly younger self and say, "Do you realise how amazing your life could have been, how much time you wasted?" I have read a dozen or so posts this morning and have been sobbing, reliving it all over again… the sadness, the struggle. I have swallowed many of those memories. You never really want to live though the sad stuff again but seeing what I went though and where I am now, I'm proud that I made it ok. I could have sunk deeper but I chose to swim.

I'm not saying the last few years has been easy… I have probably had my heart broken in more ways than in my previous years put together but I think with experience and knowledge you deal with things differently. I have already talked about my Mothers terrible illness and the repercussions that it has had on the family. But other members of my family have been ill and some have died. Death, when it happens more regularly, makes you take a really good look at your own life. Have you lived your life to the full? Are you proud of what you've achieved?

I went through years of panic attacks and endless dark days, struggling to come to terms with being childless. When I finally accepted I wouldn't be able to have children of my own, and there was no sperm donor or IVF treatment in the world that could help me, it finally set me free. That was January 2012. But then, of course, came the philosophical questions. If women are put on this earth to procreate, what is her role if she cannot have children? Why am I even here... what's the point? I began thinking of gloriously dangerous jobs I could volunteer for, because it actually didn't really matter if I died. Ok, sorry, that probably came as a shock to read. What I mean is… I just felt that there was nothing stopping me, I had no one in my life that relied on me for anything, so why not do charity work in a war zone. I thought about this for months and months assuming that now my life was worthless, I could devote myself to helping others instead. I rang up the Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières, offering my help. I was rejected again and again. Having a BA in Graphic Design is not really the qualification they are looking for… doctors and nurses, yes, a girl with an eye for a good typeface, no.

I finally rejected all the extreme ideas and focussed on what I could do... be a good friend, a supportive and loving daughter, a wonderful sister. I seemed to be able to make people laugh and cry when I wrote, so why not leave that as my legacy instead? So I started a new, more positive blog called “What I Saw. What I Heard.” I began a creative writing class, writing story after story, until finally one of them won a prize. After years of feeling worthless, that one silly little literature prize made me feel that life wasn't shit and that I could do something worthwhile. I started traveling more, visiting friends and family around the world, really embracing the freedom I had, that not having children had given me. Instead of being made to feel selfish (my own doing), I took my childlessness by the horns and ran with it.

2012 was my year of writing and finding my new independent self but 2013 was my year of love, passion and heartbreak. I had woken up in January, happy and confident, realising that my life was pretty wonderful but that I really wanted to fall in love again. Friends and family can fill your life with love and laughter but being in love, having a partner to hold your hand and grow old with, that can not be replaced with writing and traveling. So, I bit the bullet and joined a dating website. I had 9 disastrous dates and then I met Mr Blue (a pseudonym of course).

Mr Blue was the most romantic, handsome, loving, tender man I have ever met. He was a widower, having his lost his wife to cancer 15 months earlier. He had been married to her for 21 years... they met when he was 18. She was his only love. He was still grieving terribly but felt ready to meet someone and try and love another. In fact, in one of the very first letters he wrote to me (yes, he really was old school romantic), he said, “I just want you to take this big broken heart heart of mine and hold it in the palm of your hands”. His letters were beautifully written and made me weep with the tenderness he expressed. I have never ever experienced anything like the love I felt for him. It came quickly and explosively and I was so unprepared for having this man turn my life upside down, that I really did go through all the ridiculous symptoms... not eating or sleeping, crying all the time. But I realised a lot of my tears were for him and his wife and not for our happiness. The more I heard him talk about his late wife, the more I knew he wasn't ready. His grief was palpable and raw and he cried openly about how much he missed her. Every day I spent with him was emotional... his pain and sorrow transferred from tears to incredible passion in bed. It was the one time we were together that he could forget her and so it became all consuming. He did love me, I don't doubt that for a second, but he also knew he wasn't ready to leave her love behind. He began feeling that he was being unfaithful, that he was betraying her by being with me. I honestly thought we could get through it, that our relationship was strong enough. I offered him time... time to grieve on his own. We talked, we cried, we wrote letters to each other and after a week away with a friend, I came back, thinking things would be ok. We sat on Wimbledon Common and he told me he couldn't do it anymore... that his guilt was eating him up, that he was betraying her and that he would rather hurt me now, than a year from now. That he would rather be alone with the warm comfort of his grief than be with someone he couldn't give himself fully to. I was devastated. I cried for weeks. I wrote him letters saying I would wait, and then didn't send them. I wrote him letters saying how much I missed him and, they too, are still sealed in my kitchen drawer. I stupidly deleted all traces of him from my phone, I threw away the letters, the books he had given me. My heart was in so many pieces that I couldn't risk seeing a glimpse of him.

It has been 6 months. I have only just been able to wake up without thinking about him. When friends ask about him, I still cry. I miss him so much but my recent tears are not only for the breakup but for him, his grief. I am so sad for him... I can see past the relationship and my love for him now and recognise the grief and pain he must have felt. And I want to reach out and comfort him and make it better, but I know he will never reply if I wrote. I know his guilt is too much. He knows he broke my heart and will never ever contact me again. The heart hurts more when there is no tangible reason to break up... no one was unfaithful, no one shouted or screamed, no one moved away. It's sad.

I went to Alaska for a month in September, which helped me think about other things. I then had a stupid fling just before Christmas... the cliché rebound. A Canadian, with so little in common it was quite perfect. And so here we are in 2014. No boyfriend and certainly no internet dating... I may have found the love of my life on there but I just can't go through that again, any time soon. I have a very full social life though, great friends, I try and challenge myself all the time by doing different things, and have booked 4 holidays already. And, of course, I'm still writing...

Two Years and Three Months.

It has been two years and three months since I last wrote on Single Supplement. I began to find it harder and harder to put things into words, because all my inadequacies were there for everyone to see and I started to feel quite vulnerable. I was also embarrassed at the ridiculous state of my love life, or lack of it, and have been cringing as I re-read some of the posts! With my other blog, I write about the funny things in my life, what I do, who I see, where I've gone. I try to be witty and upbeat and I don't talk about the pain or the suffering I often feel. Maybe I thought that by not writing or thinking about it, it would go away. My parents are like that… stoic, traditional, the 'stiff upper lip' generation that are embarrassed by confessions and emotions. They seem to brush things aside, rise above the shit and get through life with a deep breath and a pat on the back. That was until my mother was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, two years and three months ago. Oh my God. I have, literally, only just realised that's when I stopped writing this blog… how extraordinary. So, unknowingly, I stopped writing about my true feelings the moment my mother got ill. In fact, not only did I stop writing, but I stopped talking. Hmm… what would a therapist think of that?

Well, I can actually answer that question because I saw mine very soon after my mum became ill. I sat in my therapists office, crying, but not uttering a single word. When I managed to eek out a sentence, around the 56th minute of the hour, and explain my wracked sobs, my therapist knew exactly what was going on. Suddenly, I had to think about someone else other than myself. I became meaningless the moment I saw my strong vibrant mother turn into a small frail bird. She physically and mentally disappeared in just under a fortnight - the metamorphosis was staggering. I have gone through illnesses with friends and family over the years but nothing quite so terrifying as this. My Father has survived his cancer for almost 12 years, my sister has had surgery, other relatives and friends have been terribly sick, but their personalities haven't changed. In the depths of my mothers depression, I don't recognise her. I now understand why mental illness scares people so much… because it's totally unpredictable. And you, as the loved ones, know that it can't be cured with a pill or potion, with kind words or a hug, you just have to wait and hope and pray the darkness will fade. My mother does have an incredible team of doctors and therapist and they prescribe and they talk and they suggest… but it really does all come down to time. Just waiting for her to get better.

Each depressive episode seems to last about 3-4 months, and each of those times seems to be triggered by winter. She gets depressed around the beginning of December and starts to get better in Spring… we don't know why. The not knowing is the hardest things to grasp. No one really knows the cause of bipolar disorder, experts included… all they agree on is that it's a chemical change in the brain. Some experts believe that it can be brought on by trauma, or by a latent memory of an unhappy childhood for instance, but this usually happens to people in their 20's, 30's or 40's. My mother was 71 when she was diagnosed, and for all the Doctors I have spoken to in the last two years and three month, that is very very unusual. Why now? Has she really stored up all tough times she's experienced through her life until this moment in time, when she and my father lead a comfortable happy life, living in a lovely Hampshire village, surrounded by friends and family? It doesn't make sense. 

My mother has experienced trauma though… her own father suffered from bipolar disorder, although in the 1960's it was called manic depression. My grandfather owned a farm in Lincolnshire. He was a proud man and kept the profound darkness he felt to himself. He had to keep the farm going, struggling every day with his demons but unable to tell a single soul… and when it finally got too much, when he was enveloped by the black cloud, he hung himself. My mother was in her early 20's, newly married and had just had her first baby, my sister. She was suffering from baby blues (the gentle mid century term for post natal depression) and suddenly, as the oldest and most responsible daughter, had to not only take care of her distraught mother, but also her 3 younger siblings. From that day, my mother was always the one who took care of everything. She helped her sister and brother through cruel addictions with drugs and alcohol; she also watched my grandmother's slow decline into alcoholism and dementia; she was helpless to prevent the loss of all the family savings through some unfortunate investments, and therefore have their lives change overnight and forever; she has seen my sister go through a devastating divorce and struggle to get her life back on track; and she has watched me, her younger daughter, go through life threatening surgery, numerous heart wrenching break-ups, and witnessed my constant feelings of inferiority and disappointment of being both unmarried and childless. So yes, my mother has had upset in her life. She has had cause to be depressed but she has never allowed herself to feel it. To push the pain down, to change the subject, to not dwell on upsetting things… this is the way my mother was brought up and how she has always dealt with pain, with disappointment, with anger, with sadness. Until now, it seems.
      
Currently, my mother is in her third bout of depression, but, on seeing the cherry blossom on the trees and the daffodils springing up from the earth, I'm hoping the longer days and brighter light might signify it is nearly at an end. Her illness has aged my father, yet it has also brought out a tenderness that my sister and I have never seen before. For my sister and I it has meant worry and stress like never before. But I, possibly because I have no husband or child to distract me, have maybe immersed myself a little too much. I read every article and science magazine to try and understand this horrible illness and discover a better treatment. I send dozens of emails to my father, suggesting sleep treatments and light therapy, I phone constantly and visit every few weeks… but the more I have tried to fix my mother, the more I have become ill myself.

I cannot remember the last time I slept well. I am plagued with migraine type headaches and seem to come down with every cold and infection going. I know I'm run down but I can't stop worrying and trying to help. A month ago, I was told by my Doctor and sister, to take a step back, to not get quite so involved because it was consuming me. I was going to bed thinking about my mother, and waking up a few hours later in tears, angry and despairing at this cruel change of fate. Because my mother should not be spending the last few decades of her life with this illness, it's not fair. She has lived her whole life as one of the most energetic, wonderful, generous and slightly eccentric people I have ever known. She is an incredible and inspiring mother, sharing her passions for the arts, literature and her joie de vive with me, and making me the person I am. So why now, is that being taken from her?