*trig* Overdose.

This is still quite difficult to talk about, but I'm starting to find it weird that nobody knows. I think this is the first time I've put a trigger warning on a post, but there will be some details, so please be sensible about deciding to read this.

So, last week I took an overdose. I have yet to fully understand why, but let's just say exams certainly played their role. One exam in particular which, after doing a practice, it looks like I'm going to flunk. Stupid, eh? Taking an overdose over that. Of course, it wasn't just that. There was also the wonderful *cough* meeting with my psychiatrist where she succeeded in making me feel like I will never be understood by anybody, and hey, how could anyone miss me if they never knew me? Not the first time this has happened - that I've been very misunderstood, and someone has judged by my appearance of being fine rather than me saying I'm not - so everything that has ever made me feel suicidal before resurfaced pretty much all at once. Spent the cycle home trying not to burst into tears, and by the time I got to the relevant junction I had already decided to go home via the chemist and buy as much paracetamol as I could get my hands on.

I had no trouble getting 4 packets, even though the woman at Boots pointed out that I shouldn't take plain paracetamol with a cold medicine that contained it, but quite happily sold both to me once I had assured her that I wouldn't take them together (you have to lol really, don't you). When I got back to my room I tried texting a friend, but to be honest I think it was already too late. My mind was already made up.

I went online to try and find out what a lethal dose would be, and discovered that it's extremely hard to kill yourself with paracetamol - all it will do is fuck up your liver. And I got an e-mail from my dad as I was sitting there, which reminded me of my family and why I shouldn't go through with it. But ultimately, I was feeling like even my family never had and never would understand me, let alone know me, and hey maybe if I took enough I would just die from liver failure. (Apparently, as I discovered later, it's a grim way to die. Prolonged and very painful. Don't even think about it.)

I stopped crying, put on a calm song, and started taking the first packet. When it was finished and I was about to move on to the second, I suppose you could say I had a lightbulb moment. Whatever it was, I realised what the hell I was doing. I tried to call NHS Direct to see if it was worth getting an ambulance out, but all I got was an automated voice telling me I could go to their website for hay fever information, and then giving me a list of possible reasons for calling followed by numbers to press. I hung up, and went straight to 999.

Luckily, the paramedic who came out in his ambulance-car was lovely. He had an app on his iPhone to work out the ratio of paracetamol to my weight, and whether I needed checking over, and decided that I did, just to be safe. Drove me up to the hospital where I had my blood pressure and a heart scan done, and was made to drink charcoal water. Yes, charcoal water. Literally, it's just water with charcoal in. Possibly the foulest thing I have ever had to consume in my life (and bear in mind I've eaten fried caterpillars), meant to line your stomach and/or make you sick. I was sick. It's pretty weird having opaque black liquid coming out of your mouth, a bit sci-fi. That if nothing else has put me off ever overdosing again...

They phoned my mum, and she came down a couple of hours later. It was difficult to see her, but nice to have some company, and she brought some magazines. I'd had nothing to do for 2 hours, having gone down to meet the ambulance in the clothes I was wearing and that was it. Had to have some bloods done 4 hours after coming in, to make sure it wasn't in my system any more, and then I was meant to wait to see their in-house psychiatrist. In the end, having been there for over 9 hours and with no certainty we would be seen any time soon, I discharged myself and promised to go to the other hospital (where I usually go, where my psych is) the next day.

Which I did, and had a very awkward meeting with her where I had to try and explain why seeing her the day before had basically led me to go home and overdose. Fun times, right...

That was last week, and this week I've come home because I don't feel safe in College. It's the stressful atmosphere, the focus on exams (which start on Monday), and the fact that sitting at my desk in my room just makes me think of how I sat there calmly swallowing handfuls of paracetamol. Sigh.

I now seriously doubt I'll do at all well in my exams, because I've done very little revision as a result of this whole crisis, but at least the examiners will be informed of circumstances so they should be bumping my grades up a bit. Never mind. I suppose the nice thing is that everything has been very much put in perspective; exams are now just something I have to do, rather than this massive event upon which my future depends. Almost not having a future kind of does that. Don't get me wrong, I'd rather not have gone through a suicide attempt and just be stressed about exams the same as everyone else, but at least I have less stress to contend with on top of the depression. The fact that I don't have it in me to survive anything else is probably contributing too; my mind knows that exam stress is beyond my capabilities right now, so I just go into denial instead. I really do feel like I've reached the end of the line in terms of what I can cope with; I'm still suicidal and just staying alive is quite enough. Another challenge would simply be beyond me. You guys know it's been one thing after another for about 7 years, and there has to come a point where you just say: that's it, no more.

That's the point I have reached. Everybody please cross your fingers that nothing else happens in the next two weeks before exams are over...

A bit of shit news

Fucking hell, sat in tears. Over something some people might say it frankly a bit trivial. Just got an e-mail from my tutor about the practice exam I did a coupla weeks ago, basically telling me I failed miserably. And if I perform like that in the real exam in 3 weeks? Then I won't get a 2.i.

Now, OK, in the worst case scenario, I get a 2.ii. Provided my other tutor gives me a good reference, then I might still be able to do the MA I want. (Let's not think about what happens if she doesn't give me the reference, or if just a reference isn't enough to compensate for a shit degree in the eyes of Bath University.) But getting a 2.ii is about more than that.

All throughout school, and especially in 6th form when my eating disorder was killing me, the one thing I had to hold onto was my education. I knew that, no matter how much I hated myself, I was not willing to sacrifice my education to some stupid disease. That was my main weapon against the ED. (That, and the fact that I was expecting to be happy at uni, which I've already talked about in previous posts.) It was the same story in 1st year when I put on weight, and was so tempted to go back into the welcoming arms of the ED, but I refused because my education was too precious. I have essentially been working towards this degree ever since I started secondary school. I've spent my whole life knowing I would come to university, and my whole life knowing I would do well. I always have done well - I was a bright student at school and I've come to expect high results from myself. I got great grades at GCSE, and straight As at A-Level, including full marks in some of my papers. And it was all going into the pot ready to get a good degree.

And now? I've come to realise, just now, in the last 20 minutes, that my worst fears have, in fact, come true. The one thing I have spent YEARS fighting against, trying to avoid, is probably about to happen. That, after all the effort I put in to preventing it, my degree has been taken over by my depression, and my eating disorder. That's it. Gone. You don't get a second chance. I have to somehow try and admit, maybe even accept, that what I've been working for what feels like my whole life, has been taken away from me. And I won't ever get it back. If I get a 2.ii, it's not just the MA I have to worry about. I'll have to go my whole life knowing that my chance to truly shine, and show what I'm capable of, just ended up on the scrapheap of fucking "mental health".

Brilliant.