Stressed? You will be…

I woke up this morning and felt like my body didn’t belong to me. I was having to deliberate about each footstep and mentally tell myself what to do next. Even for really simple things like washing my hair. I just tried to call my friend, and she’s one of those people whose number I’ve been calling for years; it’s one of those numbers that my fingers know off by heart and I got it wrong. I had to stop, take a breath and then say the number in my head and concentrate hard on where to put each finger. Hanging out the washing and bringing in the dry laundry has been a severe challenge to my co-ordination.

It goes without saying, really, that this is testing my patience somewhat. In fact, even sitting here typing this is testing my patience severely. I’m – what?- a hundred words or so in and already I’ve had to use the spellchecker umpteen times. Usually my fingers fly over the keyboard and I can beat out paragraphs nearly as fast as I’m thinking them. Today, the effort involved is incredible.

It’s making me think, though, about how ineffectual print is to convey the act of writing. It’s hard to express the effort and thought and agony, sometimes, behind each word. My brain is mushed. Seriously. I just typed ‘between’ then, when I was trying to write ‘behind’. When I started writing the previous sentence, I couldn’t spell ‘brain’, either. Part of me wants to leave all the mistakes in, to demonstrate just how rubbish my physical ability to transcribe my mind’s wanderings is, but I am too vain and too much of a perfectionist to do this. I may feel like a retard today but i have no intention of giving anyone else the opportunity to think that.

I can only imagine that these are side-effects from the Lamotrigine. When my GP first said she wanted me on a mood stabiliser, she gave me a week to think about it and told me to go and do some research. Off I went, and looked at all kinds of things – the manufacturer’s statements, which of course are just glorified sales pitches written in reassuring medicalese; I looked at countless users’ and ’survivors’ websites, I looked at the NHS NICE Guidelines for Bipolar Disorder In fact, I looked at so much, and read so many books that my head went a bit potty with the weight of it all. But yes, the overwhelming concensus appeared to be that Lamotrigine was going to be nicer (I use that word with a hefty dollop of irony) than a lot of the other medication available.

You know, I still haven’t received a formal diagnosis. I am also not one to advocate the risky process of Self-Diagnosis With Internet Help. But really, I’m a mental health professional. I’ve worked with people in every state of illness imaginable for over ten years. Technically, my GP can’t make a diagnosis: I have to see a specialist to get one. Have I seen the specialist? Have I chuff. My GP mentioned cyclothymia, but as I understand it – and indeed as all the clinical guidelines instruct the doctors – depression in cyclothymics is ’subclinical’ rather than severe. I know, and my GP knows, that my depression is not ’subclinical’ in any way. Last year I was seriously bloody ill and posed a major risk to myself. God forbid anyone would read this and think that what I’m saying is [adopts Cartman voice here] ‘Nehhh. My depression is bigger than your depression,’ because I’m not. But what I am saying is that my depression is bigger than cyclothymic depression and therefore I need to see the specialist.

Gah. I am sitting here getting het-up and frustrated, and not just because it took me three tries to spell ’sitting’ just then. I am going to ring the GP’s surgery now and ask what’s happening about me seeing the psychiatrist, because the NICE guidelines say that I should. And I’m being prescribed medication which I have only ever professionally observed to be used to treat epilepsy or bipolar disorder. In fact, in the US, it’s specifically licensed as a treatment for both these conditions. The UK licensing issue is sketchier, because neither the BNF nor the patient information leaflet make any mention of any mood disorders whatsoever. Glaxo SmithKline’s clinical trials register is interesting, though. There is a part of me (mostly the vain woman part) that is extremely concerned that they felt the need to be researching the emergence of PCOS -type symptoms in female Lamotrigine users.

But I digress.

I am Not Well. Today I am also Not Well due to the medication I am taking because I am Not Well.

* * *

I just had a phonecall from a guy who’s an occupational therapist with the local Primary Care Mental Health Team. This is a new team that works with GP services. My GP had referred me to them to explore options for counselling and support. The guy – we’ll call him Dave – said that he was loathe to work with me directly because I’m a member of staff and because there might inevitably be occasions where our paths would cross in the future. He then directed me to my employer’s Staff Psychological Wellbeing Service, who have an appointment for me tomorrow to see a counsellor there.

It’s a two and a half hour bus journey away. Plus a taxi to the place. Then two and a half hours home on the bus. All because I’m a member of staff and local services are ‘loathe’ to see me. the knock-on effect of this is that I have to cancel my GP appointment in the morning, and oh! joy of joys! the next available appointment is on Friday 14th, by which time I will have run out of all my medication. I have the option of calling every morning at 08.30h to see if there’s an ‘emergency’ appointment, but they can’t guarantee which doctor I’ll get to see. To say I am well and truly cheesed off with all this is an understatement.

The secretary at the Wellbeing Service asked me the reason for my referral. She said, ‘Is it stress?’

I almost laughed.

If I wasn’t stressed before, I certainly am now.