Counselling and Stuff Part 2

In part 1 I looked at my first counselling session after being diagnosed as having stress related depression. The need to seek counselling is serious but this next part is really serious. In “Al gets his cycling badge” I told you about the end of the ride when I broke down in tears. Sat in the garage not being able to take my cycle shoes off was the lowest point of my life at that time. Time to do something.

I rang Cerys the next day in hope that she could help, the response was “time for coffee and cake mister”. I met her the same day over coffee and cake (true to her word). She listened and said nothing. Suddenly she stood up and just said “you need more help than I can give” and left. In two minutes she came back with her manager. A new counsellor was assigned the next day and off I went. The first meeting was with a counsellor and a doctor, this was serious! The second session a week later was along the same lines and the doctor diagnosed me as having complex symptoms of severe anxiety with psychotic episodes. I could not stop thinking of the Hitchcock shower scene (target audience). Drugs were prescribed and a set of twelve sessions.

Tablets taken it was time for session 3. In the waiting area I was getting more and more wound up, why I don’t know. Then in the session it became clear, I was not gelled with him. Whether it was the relationship I had with Cerys and was comparing too much or was it his sparkly braces and bright red doc martens? Coco the clown kept coming to mind (cue circus music). If there is one thing that counselling has taught me is to be honest. I was pleasant but honest and at the end said this was not working. He accepted it and a new counsellor was assigned. Don’t be scared to do this folks, it’s accepted practice. It meant waiting two weeks but the return visit proved my point. Straight away there was a different vibe and I felt comfortable. Martin said the follow week would be a hard one and I should have the day off work so that I could properly recover mentally. Gulp.

I think this is the one where you need to be broken to be built back up again. I went to session 5 with trepidation and not looking forward to it. The session turned out to be about my childhood going back through old feelings, the trials and tribulations of growing up in the footsteps of your brother, the loss of my father and THAT birthday card! Suddenly Martin got up and I noticed he was in tears “that has really got me” and walked out the room. What the hell!!! What could I do but get my phone out and look at cat videos on Facebook. Two minutes later an apologetic Martin came back and we resumed after me asking him if he was ok! We talked some more about the the ride that caused the issues and the voices I heard. This is when Al was named by Martin, giving the voice a name would be part of a coping strategy later. At this point Al was pissing himself, “what a state to get yourself in, talking to this muppet” was one of his statements. At the end I felt drained, knackered and tearful; I was in a right state. Martin suggested session 6 would be the same but then we could look forward to making a friend of Al and start moving forward.

Session 5 got me thinking, yes I was following in the footsteps throughout my teenage years, being more a daddy’s boy but I was better than my brother at one thing, sport! I was successful at Rugby playing at a high level, England schoolboy cap for Christ sake. so let’s focus on that, “nah don’t bother you didn’t get much further”said Al. Session 6 followed on, much the same as the last one, discussing my relationship with my mum and the death of my father. Al continued to laugh and put doubts in my mind but Martin fought back and suggested that I was a strong guy. Why was I here then? I was being too strong in my life. Due to my footsteps following I had developed a strong independence, a sod it attitude but one where I felt vulnerable at times especially when things were not going my way. When my dad died suddenly, at an emotional time for me and my wife, I felt the need to be strong for both my mum and my wife so much so I did not grieve for my dad. It was bottled up all these years, especially in recent years when my mum was diagnosed with Dementia; need for strength again.

Let’s just dip into the stuff bit for a while. I was given a prescription for drugs to help me calm Al down, a chemical way of telling him to shut the f**k up. Around about session 5 I was beginning to ache, be tired all the time and a particularly painful back. Cycling was too much as was all exercise. I went to the drs and sent for tests. The back pain was my kidneys not working properly and this was diagnosed as a side effect of the drugs; time for a change.

The new tablets took time to kick in and the pain got worse. Al took the opportunity to increase the intensity of comment and put greater doubt in my mind. This was not the drugs according to Mr Al, it was more serious than that. Clear thinking was not possible for me. On my way home from session 6 I was sat on the train thinking how bad I felt or rather Al was telling me. My wife was due to pick me up from the car park of a small station at the normal time. I got off the train and stopped dead in my tracks (no pun intended). Apparently I stood still staring at the railway line, according to my wife who was watching. Thinking I had dropped something she came on to the platform “ if you have dropped a pound, I would hate to see you when you have dropped a tenner” were her words. I did not respond accept to move closer to the platform edge, I had decided to kill Al. She grabbed me and pulled me back, she later said I was both cold to the touch and in my eyes. I burst into tears in the car for a good ten minutes, I was nearly one of the poor people who become a sad loss. That was the Tuesday.

The rest of the week went ahead in a blur, a fog of nothingness. I did my job so well nobody knew any thing was wrong. Saturday came, went out for a ride but it was not the same. I was tired, out of breath all the time and just wanted to get home. Sunday night. My wife didn’t realise what I was doing. I told her I was off on to the turbo trainer in the garage as she was watching “ her shite” as I called it on the tv. Be about an hour I said. With great stealth and dexterity I took the car keys with out her knowing.

The next bit is what I have found out later. Apparently I set off in the car to a place I knew. After an hour my wife wondered where I was as there is no way I can do this long on a turbo. She turned the corner of the house to find the car gone, and so was I. Thankfully my phone is traceable and the app was showing the phone in a remote place near the East Coast Mainline. She called the police and told them where I was near. I was stood on the side of the tracks when after half an hour the police found me and put me out of arms way. I was taken to a McDonalds drive through car park of all places and sat in the police car talking to a calm, sensitive and listening young police man whilst drinking awful coffee that his colleague had bought us. Why he asked? Why there? Did I plan to kill myself? Is there no one to talk to? I looked at him and just said “ yes I have had enough, yes I wanted to kill Al (that made him sit up until I explained) and no it was not planned. “If it was planned I would have known not to do it on a Sunday as no trains ran on time On a Sunday“ suddenly we both started laughing. My car pulled up with my wife and a female police officer in it. My wife was distraught and just held me. The police apparently said that unless she could guarantee that she could keep me at home they would need to section me. She gave all the assurances she could and I went home. I wanted to kill myself because that was the only way in my addled mind that I could get rid of Al who was now in his element “can’t even get that right!” Were his words.

Monday was a mixture of sleep, tears and little talk. Questions over why I didn’t talk to her about it, how she felt let down almost insulted that I couldn’t tell her. Well there are several things here. Nothing was planned in any great detail, if it was I would have consulted my train tracker app to see the times the train would have arrived, why would I talk to someone who would try to talk me out of it and no this was not a cry for help. This was the only way I could kill Al and the by product was my demise.

I saw several doctors over the week and then saw Martin on the following week. I went over it again but there was no comeback from Martin. He just calmly said let’s strike it from the record, it’s done and no need to go back thus saving me the embarrassment I felt. “What we’re to do is concentrate on the future and coping strategies”. In other words as Martin put it “ let’s stop feeding Al”. Sessions moved to weekly in the hope of getting some momentum up and stopping negative thoughts breaking in. Al was in trouble or so I hoped.

The next blog will look at what we put in place to stop feeding Al the ammunition he required