Flats and Jobs - Oh Bugger

Right, so, complications.
I agreed with a friend in Moscow that I would move in with her after her flatmate moved out - the only problem being that the current flatmate was moving out in May, and I wouldn't be arriving until September. No problemo, we thought, she knew someone who might want to come and live the summer with them. Except, it turned out that person didn't want to do that.
So they were left with an empty room and extra rent to pay, and nobody to help them pay it. I reluctantly offered to pay if it came to that, since it's kinda my fault that they can't just get a long-term tenant in; although I feel she should have known this might happen when she agreed to let me move in in September. Nobody's fault, really, but I do feel partially responsible which is why I offered to pay.
For a few weeks I heard nothing, so assumed that all was well and they'd found a flatmate for the summer after all. Messaged her yesterday just checking in, and got a reply today saying no, they haven't found anyone. Someone has been there for July, but that didn't pay for the room being empty in June, and it won't cover August either. Her landlady is now demanding the money.
I'm going to borrow it from my parents and wire it over to her, because I don't see another way out of this. I don't want to leave them hanging by saying "ok get a long-term tenant in" and dropping everything; but at the same time, I'm pissed off that it has come to this. It was so simple when we arranged it, and now everyone's so stressed out over it. She and her boyfriend (the 3rd housemate) have had 2 tiring and stressful months trying to find a summer tenant, and I now can't book flights for New Zealand in January because I can't do that *and* send them rent money. Gargh. And most of all, I'm worried that this is going to tarnish our friendship and make living with them awkward. That's the last thing I want/need. Everything was going so swimmingly between us and now, it's all gone understandably tense.

And then, my wonderful job fell through, and I've got to do another one for admittedly similar pay but considerably harder work - nannying a 7-year-old boy rather than a 12-year-old girl. The family also want me to work until 10pm which I cannot understand, because the kid will surely be in bed long before that, so I'm trying to negotiate getting off at 9. I need evenings for rehearsals, and seeing my Russian friends so I can actually learn some Russian! Bloody hell, why did it suddenly get so difficult.

Tempted to just give up emotionally and see this as yet another example of why I shouldn't get my hopes up about anything. But I can't afford to do that. I need hope right now. I need it. Last time I gave up hope I saw afterwards that it was a mistake, one that I don't want to make again. Must keep going. 

Name Change and Other Developments

Since I'm no longer at Oxford (not possible!!) I think it's time to do away with 'Oxford Blues'. I think I was the only person who got the pun anyway.

Besides, I shall now be blogging about different things. Still depression, still eating disorder recovery, but now in the big wide world rather than the insane, manic bubble that is Oxford University. It was a challenge in itself, but I've survived it, and my life is changing.

On September 1st I'll be flying out to Moscow to start a new life for a year. Yes, I'll be coming back to Britain after that year to do an MA in Interpreting and Translating at Bath (if they'll have me), but I intend to return to Russia when I've done that. It's where the work is, it's where the fun is, it's where the Russian is.

My job that I had set up fell through a few days ago: I was going to be nannying a 12-year-old girl from a family so VIP that the contract stated I wasn't allowed to tell anyone their surname, and teaching her English in preparation for going to Swiss boarding school. Then Family X, as I call them, suddenly decided they only needed a part-time nanny, not full-time as I was going to be. Well, I say full-time; that is, out-of-school hours 4 days a week and one day at the weekend. They would also take me on holiday with them to Italy for two months in the summer and continue to pay me, thank you very much. So I was pretty bummed when they pulled out of the deal, to say the least.

Fortunately, I did have a fall-back, and my boss very generously looked into some alternatives for me too. I shall soon have a Skype interview with a new family, also VIP according to the agency I contacted (called 'Prestige', which tells you all you need to know about their clientele), so we'll see how this pans out. It's basically the same job but with a much younger child, 5 years old, and I have no experience of working with children - eek! They know this perfectly well having seen my CV, but whatevs, employing me is their call. The pay would be £36k (ker-ching!) plus any overtime I worked by going on holiday with them. I know right, tough job but someone's gotta do it? Yeah.

I'm also going to be acting a lot and teaching drama at the Moscow English Drama School, which is a joke because I've never been to drama school. My training goes as far as Drama GCSE (that's age 15 for those outside England). Luckily the school is not training professionals, but just using drama as a way for Russians to improve their English, and allowing expats to socialise in a fun and creative way. Just as well, really, given that I have no technique whatsoever. The only technique (if you can call it that) which I am familiar with is all Stanislavski, having studied him in my theatre module at Oxford, but I'm hardly going to teach his 'system'. There's no such thing and anyway, it was designed for over-emotional Russians, not tight-laced Englishmen. I'm halfway through 'Trusting the Actor' by Brian Astbury, a friend's old drama tutor from East 15; his theory is that, quite the opposite to Russians, English actors need to think less and feel more, and I quite agree. So that will be my goal, despite having a mixed class of compatriots and Muscovites. We'll see how it goes...

On the eating disorder side of things, well, it's mixed. I've had a stomach upset for over a week now, diagnosed today as indigestion (i.e. acid reflux) and basically haven't been able to eat. I've lost not a lot but not an insignificant amount of weight - ED is loving it, recovery brain is banging its head on the table. So very very triggered to keep restricting even when I can eat again, you know how it goes - I'll just lose a bit more and then I'll stop - but I cannot allow myself to fall into that cycle again. Anorexia kills, full stop, and I don't want my parents to have to bury me. So, onwards and upwards.

Farewells

I left Oxford today, for the last time. Can't say I'll miss having to fill and then empty my room every term, but overall, it was quite sad.

It's strange to think how many of those people I'll never see again. And even if I do see them, it'll just be a brief meeting to say hello, and then we'll go our separate ways. It kind of pains me to think about the friends who are staying on at Oxford, and will continue to be friends without me there. They'll bond with each other, and I'll be elsewhere.

This summer will probably be quite a lonely one, but I hope productive in terms of recovery. I've been struggling with food lately, and I need to get on top of it asap. I cannot take my eating disorder to Russia with me. I just can't. But then at the same time, I don't want to take "unnecessary fat" with me either... It's the eternal dilemma. I don't want an eating disorder, but I do want to be thin(ner). Question is, which do I want more?

I've got about 3 good self-help books that I've started, and hopefully will finish over the summer. I've got two months to myself, which hopefully I'll survive and make the most of, rather than wallowing in loneliness. I need this time to heal.

I really find it hard to get my head around the fact that university is over. I'm ready to move on, but still, I'm used to it being my life. I'm used to being a student, not an adult working a proper job! Ok, I'll be going back into education in a year, which is comforting, but still... I'll be sad not to be living the student lifestyle, although I won't miss the work or the pressure or the exams. That, I can do without. And it's good that I have something to go to after the summer, a decent living plan that factors in both work and play. Cannot wait to be acting again, like, seriously cannot wait.

I suppose I'll be kind of reviewing my life over the next few days. Taking stock of the changes. It has yet to sink in that I'm not an Oxford student any more. I might have to change the name, or the tag, of my blog, though I don't quite feel I've escaped the clutches of Oxford yet - probably won't until I've got my results and the degree is well and truly over.

So, a sad day, but one that had to come. And I'm glad it has come. Any more time there would have been too much. I've been through a lot, and learnt a lot, and grown a lot, and now I'm ready to close that chapter of my life.

I hate exams.

That's it, pretty much. I've done 3 so far this week and I'm absolutely exhausted. Which wouldn't be a problem if I didn't have to do 5 more. Have an appointment at the hospital tomorrow which is probably a good thing. It's difficult to tell whether I would be feeling suicidal without exams, but the fact that they're happening now feels like exceptionally bad timing. Like, I'm just not ready to go through something else. I've had to put up with so much, and I feel like I've run out of ability to cope. Suicide has never felt so logical. I read somewhere that suicide isn't a choice - it happens when the things you have to cope with outbalance the ways you have to cope. I feel like I'm in that place right now.

Ok, so technically I'm not supposed to be worrying about what grade I get. But I can't help thinking about it. I can't help thinking "I ought to be getting a 2.i, and everyone is expecting me to" - the more people tell me they think I can do it, the more people I feel I'm at risk of disappointing. I don't want to be reassured I'll get good grades. I want to be reassured that it doesn't matter, because if aiming for a 2.i is making me feel like I want to kill myself, then it clearly isn't worth it. I get why people want to try and tell me they think I'll do well, but that's so not the point. My parents have been texting me wishing me good luck and saying that I know my stuff, and I appreciate the sentiment, but I wish they would understand that it's not about how well I do any more. It's about whether I can survive until 12:30 on June 10th, simple as. And it doesn't look especially likely at the moment. The pressure is too much. And everyone telling me they think I can get a 2.i just increases the pressure, because it obliges me to try and live up to that expectation. And on top of that, it implies that getting a 2.i is important; you'll be happy if you get one, right? No, I'll be fucking happy if I'm still alive by the time results come out. I wish people would stop having expectations of me full stop. I can't handle them. It's like, stop telling me you think I'll be fine and LISTEN to the fact that I'm not. Because I'm not worried about whether I get a 2.i. I'm worried about whether I can survive the pressure to. And that pressure is not relieved by people telling me I'll get it, thereby reinforcing its importance - it's relieved by people saying you know what, fuck results, let's just focus on staying alive. That's the level I'm operating on here. Why is everyone refusing to see that?

Gargh. No wonder suicide is foremost in my mind.

*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.

Just a feeling...

So I've been getting this feeling lately. That recovery...isn't really gonna happen for much longer. Like, I'm going to relapse, and *want* to relapse.

Don't get me wrong, I've been doing amazingly well in recovery for a long time now. I've gone months and months without any behaviours, my weight has been healthy and stable for well over 2 months, and I eat pretty much whatever the hell I want.

But it's not sitting comfortably with me.

Somehow, it just all feels fake. Like I'm going through the motions, but deep down, I'm not feeling it. Those thoughts I used to have, that used to protect me; thoughts like 'you need to eat, it's natural' and 'everyone's telling you to eat, so you should'...they just aren't really cutting it right now. In fact, I feel more and more like I don't even care whether it's healthy or natural or not. Like, yes, I know you need to eat to stay alive, but I don't care. I don't. care.

It's kind of frightening, but at the same time, just feels right somehow. I don't understand it. It's as if the momentum that has always kept me propelling forwards into recovery has just switched off. I was always afraid of taking my eating disorder from my teens into the rest of my life, into 'adulthood'. Well, I've already brought the bloody thing to university, I'm graduating in a few months and it's still there. Fucking hell. So it's like I've crossed some kind of threshold - I'm already into what I thought of as adulthood, and the eating disorder hasn't gone away, and maybe that's alright. I'm getting used to it. It doesn't feel as strange as I was expecting it to. It did for a bit, but not any more. It feels ok now, ok to still be ill, ok to still be feeling like this. As though it's a part of me that I can never change.

And I won't say it isn't terrifying to think that I might be stuck with it for the rest of my life. But at the same time...the thought of letting go of it for the rest of my life is pretty terrifying too. I don't understand people who are just happy all the time, in general. I honestly, don't get it at all. Like, how is that possible? How is it possible to be alive and not be suffering? Seriously?

Ok, so I'm starting to experience some little joys here and there, which is great. But I don't feel able to appreciate it, because in the big picture, things are still not ok. And even when they are ok, it feels so foreign to me that it's almost unreal. I don't know how to talk about being ok, because I'm so used to things being bad. I'm used to everything being wrong, and over the past couple of years with therapy and what have you I'm getting quite good at articulating it. But enjoying things? Not a clue. How do you even describe it? Like, I have a review with the eating disorder research team at the hospital, and I'm going to have to tell them that my behaviours aren't as bad as they used to be. How do I do that? I honestly don't know.

Anyway, I'm just rambling here. Not sure what I want to say, or if I'm saying it coherently (unlikely). I suppose the point is, things have been improving...but it feels false. Fake. Like deep down, I'm still exactly the same, and that no amount of improvement will change that. It's not manifesting itself in behaviour at the moment, but who knows how long that will last?