Two genders Two Tails

Anxiety! Depression!  The feeling of being completely alone with no one to go to, the feeling of being useless to yourself and really everyone and anything. You feel you’ve fallen so low, it is like how do I get back up? Or when you try something keeps happening to where you just fall back down again and again! This is just slightly a bit of how I felt during the last 12 months (January 2018 – December 2018). October was the worst when really they should have been...  Well Normal, well better than normal!

“Think about the good things!” or “think about what you have!” tend to be the most common phrases I've heard people say… Which for some reason they will think they are helping when really it only making how you feel worse. Really they are right for sure in most cases but it is just not how it works. “Just forget about them and move on!” which is one for friends, boyfriends, girlfriends etc. Again another true phrase but just doesn’t help really.

Anxiety is probably the thing that I’ve suffered a lot from especially over the past 16 months, but I didn’t know what anxiety was till someone pointed out to me. I can’t say I know a lot apart from what I’ve experienced generally it is where I can’t think, I can’t breathe properly not out of breath just struggle to breathe generally. I don’t want to be around anyone and will generally just want to stay away from people or I will be quiet around everyone. I really can be hard when it kicks off as I have to work with people and my last few jobs including the one I have now had all been customer-facing or having to talk to someone.

Anxiety attacks can be the worst again they consist of breathing faster and shorter or struggle in general, I feel faint and dizzy, a number of times I have had it where I just collapsed on the floor and a couple of times with milk in my hands so that ended up on the floor and me to clean up and as the milk was all over me. When an anxiety attack happens I feel like someone’s hands have just grabbed my brain and are squeezing really hard. When it hits I will always be in the toilets being sick through it. I just will not eat or drink at all, it has to be forced down me most times even though I know I will regurgitate it anyway… Sleep! Yeah, I’ve never got any when anxiety is around.

Lack of sleep is probably where I am at my worst when I am going through the worst parts especially when it reaches three or more days as that is where my dark side comes out. This is generally where everything that is colour just disappears. Everything is just black and grey! This is the most dangerous part of me, it is not that I am dangerous to others, I become a danger to myself. That is where I will overdo things (especially at the gym) to a point where some might want to call it self-harming. I just don’t feel pain or a desire to stop. I won’t cut myself or anything just push my body to the max but not have a rest or eat properly to recover. 

Depression! So misunderstood, people that have never been so far down always tend to criticise people on social media! “It is for attention!” is what I see online. “Give your head a wobble!”  Are more terms that I have seen and heard but it is so much easier said than done!  A human mind is an incredible tool but such a destructible one also. So much of it can drive you to self-harm and in worse cases suicide. Something I have gone through to where it is down to pot luck I am here today. also, I went through it nine months ago and was close to just completely ending it.

Having anxiety and depression does not just affect how you feel but it can affect your body and how it works! For me when I get hit by anxiety and depression especially if it hits hard it affects my IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome). For some it can cause diarrhoea, for others like me it causes constipation and as I am writing this coming out of bad anxiety and a depressive state my IBS is really acting up.

How can this happen when your brain is in the other part of the body? Looking online there was research in 2016 and when the brain has any stress, depression, anxiety it suppresses activities in the hypothalamus, pituitary gland, and adrenal glands which is why they react the way they do. Anyway! Enough of chatting crap and on to other things depression can do to the body.

• Increase the risk of heart disease,
• hair loss,
• Inflammations,
• Loss of libido,
• Chronic pain,
• Insomnia,
• Weight loss/weight gain.

That is just some of the things on how anxiety and depression can affect your body, as people we need to support each other in someone’s time of need as it can affect anyone at any time and there might come a time where you might need it, it can be a difference in someone living and someone taking their life!

Here is my dark story.

2014

Early on when I started this blog in 2014, I spoke briefly on when I was 14, young gullible and just starting to figure out what I wanted to do in life, but my Mum had a boyfriend at the time who was an alcoholic, consistent arguing, ruining holidays, Christmas amongst other stuff got on top of me from the age of 7-14 it was on continuous problem, arguing, abuse from my mum’s boyfriend etc. It got to that stage where it was affecting me and after seeing going through some really bad things I could not take it anymore. One night I remember my mum and her boyfriend got into a big fight and he slammed the door and I assumed he left and it was where I lost it. Everything in my head just went dark, I was breathing very heavily. I generally just couldn’t take it anymore!

When morning came my mum went to work to which I didn’t sleep all, it was like I had the biggest headache ever no paracetamol would shift it, my head felt like it was wobbly was completely dizzy and really was pretty disorientated. I found a ladder we kept in the house, went into the loft and found some rope which was pretty thick enough to what I thought would do the trick. In the loft it had a beam that was pretty much overhanging the entrance, I was not thinking about anyone else or myself, it was about the outcome and just how this torment would end along with anymore suffering that I was having, no more drunken episodes from my Mum's boyfriend, no more fighting that went on for so long. I do not think I gave it a second thought and down I lifted myself from the entrance of the loft on a rope to where the only thing that was hanging on to me was a rope around my neck.  

I don't know how long I was there for, all I can remember was HIM! He lifted me up and cutting me down and gasping for breath and could not stand for about 5-10 minutes. That changed my life forever!

2018

Fast Forward to 15th September after my first week off (in a job) in over a year, setting new highs, like going to watch the ice hockey as female for the first time and also going into town but on my own start to finish as female for the first time only for 14^th September to be put under investigation. For anyone that has been placed under investigation knows it is not pleasant especially when you suffer from anxiety.

I think from the moment the allegations against me was made, was when all the problems in how I felt started. I felt sick, I felt dizzy which was only to get worse I wasn’t suspended either so it was a normal 40 hours for two weeks. I worked all the way through it, was going to work and having to be around the people that were doing the investigation. Every time I stepped through the door I was hit with dizziness some days and I had to go be sick. It was not great, at home it was not good either to where I would get so worked up, my head would just blackout mainly on my bed as that is where I spend most of my time. I think I knew I was going to be dismissed all the way through it. On 28^th September 2018 I was told I was to be dismissed with immediate effect I had no emotion at all, I left and even shook the now ex-store manager hand thinking there was no point kicking off. I am still confused to why I was actually dismissed as was the Citizens Advice Bureau. Not being there for 2 years meant I had pretty much no rights.

October 2018 that was a close one! As many know 2018 was the year I started the road to transitioning to female. I got put on the waiting list, I had a to battle to get to see an endocrinologist to see me for my hormones but I had to be put on a 5-month waiting list and was knocking all my goals out of the park that I set, it was going great! …

A month went one with no luck of finding a job and I was meant to be going to Harrogate to see my endocrinologist then going to London the next day. All the hard work and the waiting to the day was just well becoming to a halt and signing back on to Job Seekers Allowance to what is now called Universal Credit really hit hard. This is where the consistent headaches started, worrying about money was not eating, constipation set in hard, all these things just hit all at once and this biggest part of me that I think set me off on really not wanting to live was shame. I felt so ashamed of myself that my life just crumbled so quickly and I fell so hard as I was so close to this extremely important chapter of my a life which I worked so bloody hard to disprove so many people that said I could not get where I wanted to be, and in such a small amount of time was pretty much on the verge of being taken away from me and nothing I could do about it.

All those feelings from 2014 just added and hit me with a double dose. I know my dad was heading out to Scotland for the weekend and that is where I thought that would be it! I (thought) lost everything, I had no self-respect, I lost all hope in myself, I lost any good feeling about everything and seeing everything in black and grey returned, consistently feeling dizzy and disorientated. At this point, I was a goner. I do not know how I felt at the time how I came up with posting about how I felt on Facebook, I generally keep stuff about being depressed off Facebook. I did not post about how I felt regards to suicide but about being really down and depressed about how hard life was at that moment in time… And boy I was in for a shock! People reached out to me and messaged me, with support and reassurance. That status also got me back on to the career path I was on in 2017. At the time the former store manager I had on Facebook saw my status and (in black and white) messaged me and said if I was looking for work still, with no hesitation I said yes and it went from there. This time it would be a new store, a few staff that joined after I left, but I would be reunited with the ones that I used to work with and all supportive of my transition. It was one of the biggest things that saved my life, it brought me back into an industry that I loved and colleagues I loved, it was not just a job but also meant my transition would be back on track!

During that week also I went to Professional Beauty North Convention which I bumped into people that knew me from doing lives in a makeup group and asked for pictures, but hopefully for future post it became the start of a good relationship with the Spectrum Brush founders! It got better from there! A couple of days later I got what would be my final pay packet from my employer, I was dismissed from and that abled me to go to Harrogate, get the green light to proceed with HRT on the NHS before I was to be seen at the Gender Identity Clinic.

Generally, it took 4 days to go from feeling rock bottom to feeling on top of the world! The thing with depression and anxiety is it is like an RKO out of nowhere! It can just hit you and really send you downhill to where you think there is nowhere to go, no one to speak to or if there is you don't want to! If you battle depression and really try as hard as it is the rewards can be astronomical! I really didn’t want to go out even to Professional Beauty in Manchester, but I forced myself and when I got in I took my makeup off and clothes just got in my onesie and I just collapsed on my bed like just fainted. It took so much to get out and go against what my head was saying. I walked out of my home thinking am I going to live past this week, to be feeling not that bad anymore!

In 2019 it has been a roller coaster but not as bad as October last year. I know I need to focus on my goals and keep pushing, I need to keep my friends I know care close and know who the right people are and concentrate on them more. Depression and anxiety for me are nothing to me when I fight back it soon goes as quick as it comes but it is getting the strength to push through it. Life will always be tough and there will always be a time where you feel you can go nowhere and it is the end, but if you can find just a small hole you can get to when you are in that bubble of darkness keep going at it as I am pretty sure you will succeed and emerge victoriously.     

This year I've tried to really push myself to the limit and that has mainly been focusing on my transition a little be more on myself than others to a point but going to the gym and exercising has made a massive difference! You get to a point where you need to go and that mental side takes over but also the issue you have just gets left at the door but also the rewards for what you put into the gym really are massive and that becomes a massive goal and you want more and the feeling you get from putting in the work is crazy in a good way! Never give up and fight it!

I want to thank some people before I finish this post because I look back still and I can’t believe how close I was to ending it all in October 2018. One is my store manager now. It was the start of the recovery and it really has to help me overcome and become a stronger person and I really can’t think of how I can repay you. Professional Beauty if it wasn’t for that event I wouldn’t have bumped into the Spectrum Sisters. Yes, The Spectrum sisters. They have been amazing with me and for letting me be behind the scenes in the photo-shoot they did in January, I just hope I was a great help to you then. Another is to a girl who I don’t talk to anymore and I have no actual reason why and it still puzzles me, but just after my meltdown she was going through a really rough time and we were talking for a bit and she helped me more than I think she realised. Knowing she was in a deep hole to come out of it quickly and in style really was a massive inspiration to me and still is.

At the time of writing this, I only had water, I guess I have to pretend it is pink gin with lemonade but I raise my glass to you all and say Thank You! Because you guys saved my life!

Samaritans -116 123
www.samaritans.org

https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/