"Toxic brain dump"

Leslie (of Something Brilliant is Brewing), "toxic brain dump"? I'll give you toxic brain dump! It doesn't get more toxic than the stuff here, so if you're feeling bad already, then please DON'T READ IT. I wrote it yesterday as just an outpouring and didn't dare post it because it's just C*R*A*P in the sense of crap going round in my brain. But it's also my life story of the the last decade. It's an example of the thinking and thought processes of a depressed person - hence all the repetition. But this doesn't mean there's tons of distortion there. It is actually the truth. This is me.

The X referred to lower down was a man I met and fell in love with before my breakdown in 2000. The failure of that relationship was a major factor in the breakdown.

I've thought recently that I had reached a place of acceptance of my illness but I see from reading this that that is not really the case. I am just in a terminal quiet despair over it.

I apologise in advance for what you are about to read. SORRY.

***

What is bingeing about? For me it's a stepping out of reality. When I binge the calorie content doesn't matter. I can consume vast amounts and there are no consequences for that. Of course there are consequences - but at the time of buying and consumption in my head there are no consequences.

Why do I need to step out of reality? Because reality is too shit. My reality is horrible. My life is a big nothing. A big stressful nothing. I am nothing. Nothing except a failure. A permanent mental health patient who can't hold it together for any length of time. Stuck in inadequate accommodation. No way of ever earning any money ever again. No marriage or kids. No job. No home of my own. My circumstances are grim indeed and it will only get worse as I get older. Because I am under 40 I still have a sliver of hope that any of these things may yet happen. But get past 40 and none of those things will ever happen. That's why I don't think I will live far beyond 40. Because I'll have no hope then. So time is running out for me on this earth.

And yet I spend my days wasting them away with bingeing and not leaving the house. If you had only a short amount of time left on this earth - less than 5 years I am certain - if you were given less than 5 years to live what would you do with the time? Chuck the diet in that's for sure! What else? Travel the world? Spend the time achieving something you always wanted to do before it's too late? I'm sure you'd have a list. I don't have anything I want to do or achieve before I die. That's how unconnected with life I've become. I am like an amoeba. Brainless and intellectually and emotionally numb. A big blob of nothing.

And bingeing is just reflecting or covering up the pain.

The only things I do in life are binge for a while and then diet for a while. I feel like that is all I've done for the last few years. Trapped in this endless cycle.

Of course, when I'm dieting and improving my health and fitness I feel like I'm on an "up", however painful and miserable it is - and the process does cause me to cry a lot. But at least I'm doing something to improve my situation. At least I have a goal, an aim in life. A reason to exist - even if it is only to lose weight. My life is planned around that - food that I'm eating, when I eat, cooking the food. The exercise - walking takes up a lot of time. It feels virtuous. It feels like I'm doing some good. And of course it's undeniable that it's better to be out walking than sat at home. It's better to eat veg and feel healthy than to be stuffing endless amounts of rubbish down myself and feel terrible.

But basically, overall, what am I achieving with my life? If I cut out the bingeing and subsequent necessary dieting, what then? What would be left then?

I have no other achievable goals. I'd like to get a job, but my levels of anxiety and depression make that impossible. I'd like to have got married and had kids but I've never met anyone and have few opportunities to do that now. And who would have me now? I'm a dead loss. I can't earn any money. And in this country at least, no man wants a woman who can't earn money. I tried internet dating but the only men I met were complete non-starters. If they weren't complete non-starters they'd be able to get a girlfriend. And if I weren't complete non-starter I'd be able to get a boyfriend.

I'd like to live somewhere nice but I can't afford it so I'm trapped here.

I can't see anything else I could achieve or do with my life apart from this horrid cycle.

Everyone needs to feel they can achieve something, that there is a reason for them to exist. Many people suffering severe totally incapacitating mental illness which they know is never going to end - like schizophrenia or bi-polar disorder - see the battle for psychological survival in itself as the meaning of their existence. And I did myself for the first year after my first breakdown. Because just to survive that year for me, when I was in such mental chaos and there was no help for me in terms of tablets or a diagnosis that pointed to a specific treatment (my diagnosis has only ever been "depressed after a breakdown"), was an achievement in itself. Every day was an achievement just to get through it. But since then I have got used to this hell. I am not in mental chaos anymore. Just total despair. I exist between this and numbness, because generally it's too upsetting to think about the reality of my situation, all the things I can't have and can't achieve any more. In fact the only good times in the time since my breakdown, almost 9 years ago, are when my eating has been very much under strict control, often (though not always) combined with a rigorous walking regime. And the worst times have been when my eating is completely out of control. They have been desperate despairing suicidal times. BUT in the last two years I'm pretty much desperate, despairing and suicidal all the time. Because I know that time has run out for me.

The only difference now between being fat or not is that when fat I have no confidence at all when I'm out of doors. When thinner it's still a huge struggle to get outdoors, but when there I am more confident. Still stressed, but more confident than when fat. And that's it. Oh yes, I have that sense of achievement when I lose the weight. But it's not real achievement of anything that will actually make a whole load of difference in my life. Yes, being more confident would improve my life a little bit. But how much time do I spend outdoors anyway? At this stage in my life and in my illness, which I believe to be terminal, is it really going to make any difference?

The next important age in my life is going to be 42. I assume this to be the age when I will kill myself. I know what ages are important. I knew since at least the age of 10 or 11 that 28 was a fundamental, important age in my life. I actually thought I would die at that age. And in a way I did - I had a breadown and the me I was before, the competant me that could achieve anything in life if she put her mind to it, died. And I wish I had completely died, because there has certainly has been no reason for me to be alive since then. Since then I have been no more than a shit machine. Next age I knew was important was 36. I thought maybe I was going to have a baby at 36. I really thought that. I didn't know that age was important because I was going to have another breakdown which left me feeling like I would never be intimate with another human being ever again. And also took away any desire for that. And in practical terms I could never have children now because no-one will ever marry me and I would never be able to pay for the support I would need to look after a baby. I mean I can barely look after myself. I wouldn't make someone a good mother. And I feel too old and tired already to do it now. It takes great energy and positivity to do that. I am exhausted from what life has already thrown at me.

But for all I know it could be another breakdown waiting for me at 42. I have no expectation of anything else. Why expect anything else. 28 was certainly a symbolic death. I wish 36 had been a symbolic rebirth. But sadly not. Sadly it has just given rise to endless despair. A sort of emotional flatness borne of trying not to think about things too deeply, or at all, because it just leads to suicidal thoughts. But if you can never address the issues then you can never find a way forward. But I've tried so many times to address them and find a way forward and failed. That is why I've given up. For some people there is no solution.

So what is there left? Making sure I wear a size 8 shroud in my coffin? That feels like the only thing I have left to aim for now.

I am so without hope. But this is not just a lack of hope due to depression and stinking thinking. This is real evidence based lack of hope. I can't see the point in anything anymore.

I've been round that diet trail so many times and it's led nowhere. A feeling of "moving forward" with my life which is actually false. Just another turn of the wheel. Another part of the cycle.

I feel trapped and there's no way out. Not that there's no way out of my weight problems. But that there's no way out of my mental health situation. The weight problem is just a manifestation of that. It has no real importantance at all.

And why am I mentally ill? I can't cope with relationships with other people. It could be argued I don't get to meet many other people to have relationships with. But I had a breakdown in the first place because I was so isolated. I became so isolated because contact with other people seemed too painful. And it still is. Because of the sh*t I feel about myself that I project into other people's minds. Always thinking they think ill of me. And this is not weight dependant. And not dependant on my mental illness. Though neither of these things help of course. They're just things to hang other people's disapproval of me on. I felt that way before the breakdown and when I was thin. I have always felt that way. That I am not worth it. Not worth anything in fact. And there seems no way to change this.

How could I ever become a worthwhile human being? I can't do a job and contribute to the community in that way. I can't be a mother and contribute to society in that way. I know you may say I make a contribution in blogland. But I don't have it in me to write on my blog every day ie to really make it a big thing in my life. To be an inspiration to other people like Diane fit to the finish, or to give people things to think about like Lyn of esccape from obesity. I just don't have it in me.

That's the worst thing of all about having a breakdown. Losing the ability to write. Before it was my raison d'etre. Now I struggle to squeeze a few words out every 3 or 4 days. Really, I find it so difficult. I find I have little of interest to say. I'm bored with myself and my braindeadedness.

Self hatred welling up again.

It doesn't seem like anything I can do would count in the real world. I could do art classes. But it would only be for me. Not for a career or anything I could sell or make a life for myself from. I could study some more, but I'm unable permanently to do a job so what's the point? Just for the sake of it?

I can't anymore cling to anything that's false. And further study would just be false because it's not leading anywhere.

I have tried so many times to work something out, to sort out my life, to find a way of moving forward. And every time I'm buggered because I can't work. That's what it comes down to in the end. I can't actually take part in real life. Not that I don't value all the contacts and support I've found on line. Of course I do. But I have no possibilities in real life and that is the problem. No solutions. And I've needed a solution for the longest possible period of time.

Desperate and suicidal yet again and feeling in need of a binge. So sad that my life is like this. It's been this way ever since X left. I should have killed myself then and avoided all this pain. My life has indeed been fucked up by falling in love with the wrong man. And there is now no way of undoing the damage. It's been too long. There is no way back from here.

***

I should point out that I am not suicidal at the moment. I'll make a deal with you, dear reader, if I'm going to do it, I'll let you know first. I think that's only fair. And then you won't be worrying about me unnecessarily.