Lockdown

At the beginning of February I was so poorly that the only time in nearly 4 weeks of me leaving the house was to go to doctor appointments or to hospital for tests. I presented all symptoms of Coronavirus but as I had not travelled or been in contact with anyone who had as far as I knew I wasn’t tested. In the space of 3 weeks I was on multiple antibiotics. One of the worst nights saw me setting up a bed in the bathroom with the shower running; the windows and door blocked up and an air diffuser with eucalyptus oil in it. All to relieve the driest most persistent cough oh my life. I made noises on inhaling and exhaling, wheezes, rattles, cracks and gurgles. I had 9 straight days of fever. I can honestly say only on one occasion had I been so scared in my life.

I returned back on a phased plan for work but by the end of the following week I was back in isolation as I was still coughing and didn’t want to cause any disrepute to the company I work for as I have a customer facing position. By the end of that week the country was in lockdown.

The situation is being covered in such a way that at time’s it is so damaging for anyone with anxiety to handle. I am petrified that if I didn’t have Coronavirus that there is something out there that has the potential to harm myself and my family worse than how much we struggled last month. If I didn’t have it then according to medical advice I would be high risk due to the severity of the respiratory infection I presented. Tonight I have a sore throat and am on the precipice of the Mariana Trench of an anxiety attack. It’s always at bloody nighttime when the distractions of the day are done and the adrenaline is calmed. The point in which the to do lists are paused and allows for the previously muted negative thoughts to creep in. There are 2 adults, 2 cats and a 3 year old in a 2 up 2 down house and after such a length of time in isolation there are aspects of every room I now want to change, move or redecorate so I feel calmer in my space, unfortunately after being off sick from work for such a time we are in a hole in which I’m unable to invest in such a manner. However I am grateful to have a roof over my head.

I never used to have this level of health paranoia it began during pregnancy and never left and this is a very bad cultural time to have such a concern. You can’t pop onto social media without seeing a list of symptoms which means I am scanning constantly for them which then means the techniques of CBT need to be employed to rationalise my lovely maladaptive brain. I’ve had some amazing messages sent me from friends and family checking in and it means the world to me and I am eternally grateful. I hope for peace of mind and health for all who read this mumbling bumbling mess. I just needed to get it out of my head.

The one I forgot to name

It’s been more than a month now since I last felt any semblance of healthy. I felt the best I had in that time yesterday morning but today is a different story. I feel like a drama queen and I hate that especially when I see others inflicted with the same infection as I have had being more resilient and high functioning but the truth of the matter is this has laid me on my ass.

It’s difficult when your mind and body run at different speeds but when your average speed has decreased due to bouts of ill health then it paves the way for the demons to fight their way through. Yet again a Visual blip when waking which I don’t know if fabricated through a tired mind or not caused a full blown spiral. The fear of having my 3rd ocular migraine in 2 weeks loomed and I have spent the day in Pyjamas and under the duvet. Today being the second day in the last month in which I have been solo whilst looking after the cub so I’m guessing it’s all probably stress related and actually the best thing for me to do is to return to work and gain as much of a routine as possible for normality to be reintroduced.

After spending a good hour lying in bed with Charlie he became restless and wanted to go downstairs. At one moment after a very brief doze on the sofa I was awoken with a kiss from my cub on my head who wanted a drink and I began to feel a little better but as the day has progressed so has the constant searching for symptoms. It is taking every ounce of CBT control to try to minimise the fallout of being so poorly. Some doctors have not helped and have fed into the fear by ordering more and more tests and throwing up complications or poorly worded reasoning behind treatments.

I haven’t had therapy in over 4 weeks and the next time I go will be to participate in a guided tour of the rooms in which I received treatment or care during labour and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t petrified.

I guess after isolation for so long and only really speaking to family and one or two friends as well as living in a constant fear bubble of having to take temperatures and clock watch for symptoms, side affects and medicines I have found myself in low mood and high anxiety and wishing my cheeky charming son could see his mummy at full shine.

A horrible fortnight

I am so unbelievably done with this current situation I find myself in.

I started to feel poorly a little over 2 weeks ago and thought not much of it having previously thought I’d done really well during the winter to avoid and colds whatsoever…

It started with not feeling too great at work and a member of the team becoming concerned about how poorly I was looking, then progressed to fever, chills, flu like symptoms as well as horrific lower back pain. Having had a stupidly high temperature peak a call to 111 meant I had to be seen by a doctor who sent me off for tests. The very next day I had a call from the receptionist stating I need to immediately start a course of antibiotics but it wasn’t until a few days later when I aired my concern that the antibiotics were not working that I was told they were prescribed because I had an inflammation marker present in my blood. I did as I was told and started a 7 day course of amoxicillin. Half way through and I was still really struggling with anything and was back in the doctors. This time the lady I saw was amazing and spent so much time with me checking me over, calming me down as she herself has issues with PTSD and poor mental health. She believed I was suffering with glandular fever so another blood test later I am waiting at home for result and I receive a call stating I need to see a doctor that day to discuss my results = hello panic stations. My entire family are on alert and freaking out. Due to flooding by my doctors I had to go to a different surgery and be seen by a different GP who basically told me that my CRP and ESR markers were abnormal and I would need to be tested in 4 weeks time to see if they went back to normal or whether further action is deemed necessary. Well I was very upset and frustrated that I had waited hours for that news and I have fought tooth and nail to not allow it to set me off on a health anxiety spiral but my body seems to want to make that difficult for me. In the last 2 weeks I have suffered with:

Bronchitis

Flu – all the symptoms

Lower back pain

Every type of thrush imaginable

Sickness and diarrhoea.

Dizziness

Yesterday I lost my hearing and this morning I had what the doctors believe to be an ocular migraine. I have to been seen later tonight to check everything is ok.

I am trying so hard to be positive and trust in the moments where I’m feeling better that I’m just absolutely run down and need to rest up but I have spent maybe 2 hours with my son in 2 weeks and I’m scared for the moment where my anxiety-ridden maladaptive brain is proven right that there is something more sinister going on. I have spent 2 weeks in bed when I’m not at the doctors or hospital listening to audiobooks. I want to hug and play with my baby so much but I’m not ok enough for it and it’s breaking my heart more than you could ever imagine. All I seem able to do is lie around and occasionally sleep.

Rain before the rainbow?

Ok so I’m not having a good day. I’ve laughed, I’ve shouted, I’ve cried and I want to sleep. I am in bed listening to the metronome of Charlie’s angel care mat fighting the urge to get in bed with him. The husband is away so I’m alone with my thoughts tonight which isn’t going so well and it’s fast approaching Halloween which would have been Grandad’s 93rd birthday and the first one without him celebrating with us.

So far tonight I’ve had chest pain, my stomach feels like I have done 100 crunches or sit-ups… we all know that didn’t happen, I’ve had dizziness, brain fog and rolling ectopic heartbeats. Oh not too mention my pupils being different sizes. I’m on alert mode, hyper vigilant scanning all the time my surroundings and myself. I hate it. I’m exhausted and I want to rest and sleep which I can’t do as well because I’m missing part of me. I am grounding myself the best of my abilities and trying to sit in these moments as these too shall pass but this is easier said than done when it’s fight or flight time. So my hope to get it out onto paper acknowledging the predicament and getting that weight off my shoulders. But that is always hard when you start experiencing new painful sensations and you are trying to put the cause down to anxiety. Like I said before I want to think horses when I hear hooves not zebras.

Breakthrough

So I am a few weeks into EMDR now and today a breakthrough occurred. My therapist and I spent a lot of time gathering my history, so essentially this was me babbling about my life for hours on end while she made furious notes and I then needed to score each event on a scale of 1-10 for how traumatic they feel to me right now well little did I know but a pattern fully emerges from the notes so vividly it may as well had been a neon sign with the words “struggles and panics with the thought of and experiencing loss!” Whether that’s a loss of a friend, the ending to engaging moment or the passing of a loved one or even myself.

This explains how loosing my grandad earlier this year as well as an old friend around the same time sent me into the foggy head space and once I again I found myself in the void. We have started using the installation process with the tappers and the sound of the beach along with the golden memory of hearing Charlie’s first ever giggle on Black Rock Sands. Well today was crazy as I felt a full on tennis match with my maladaptive and adaptive parts of my brain. When the adapter in my left hand buzzed the tension built, and I couldn’t stop myself from thinking negative thoughts but as soon as the right one vibrated I was at the beach eating chips and despite thinking of horrible thoughts 50% of the time I felt calm and at peace.

The physicality of PTSD

So I have been through a patch where I just didn’t know what to write, I had said everything going around in my head and the thought of putting words down seemed overwhelming so I focused my energies onto other means. However a conversation I had with a friend has brought me the idea that I shall make a list of symptoms I feel when I am “triggered” so that in the future I can work my way through that list as a check sheet grounding me to the here and now and hopefully pressing the pause button on some of the anxiety while I await my therapy to restart.

Migraines – I get them now much more frequently than before and unfortunately there isn’t many painkillers I can take for them due to my Sertraline

Muscle fatigue, cramps and pain – moments where I feel like Bambi when he walks across the ice, my legs have no stability in them or my arms have no strength. They also cramp a lot more frequently than before my trauma. My toes especially cramp severely on a daily basis. One area I hate this in is my neck. There are times in which I have to lie down because it feels like my neck is not strong enough to hold on to my head.

IBS – now I had my original diagnosis for IBS in 2010 so I am used to the spasms, cramping and how to control them. However the severity and frequency of episodes has increased dramatically especially at times of stress.

Sickness – on 3 separate occasions this year when I have been triggered I have ended up vomiting on one occasion I was attempting to ground myself in the garden. Using all my techniques to fight the torrent of emotions when a different wave hit me and embarrassingly enough there is now a patch in my garden which I look at in a different light now.

Costochondritis – this one is one near the top of the list for most difficult to manage. Chest pains, scary scary chest pains that instantly make you check your arms for numbness, wiggle your jaw for signs of pain… and of course psychosomatic symptoms can occur when you search for them.

Ectopic beats or pvcs – in line with the above when I have one “ticker” that is manageable for me I get so scared during an episode, I deem episodes to be ectopics back to back for longer than 30 seconds because the anxiety and fear levels rise so much that I know I will have those episodes on and off for the day and live in the fear that my heart will just give up.

Brain zaps – the feeling of an electric current passing through the old nogging. This is another one that scares me so much much when it occurs.

Pins and needles – can happen so randomly and at any point in the body. The worst area is on my head, it is so unsettling to feel it spreading down your neck.

Nightmares and sleep paralysis, also jerking yourself awake more regular – I struggle to switch off at night and these only exacerbate the issue more. I have also had on many occasions just as I have been drifting off the butterfly sensation in the stomach as if I have been on a rollercoaster drop when in reality I am lying down in bed… the onset of this is an adrenaline fuelled body who no longer can relax and scans for danger for the next 30 minutes until my body can calm itself down.

Hypersensitivity – focusing on what you smell, hear and see. Sometimes I am that focused I can see the vibration of the blood pulsing through the capillaries in my eyes. There are times when I am over stimulated. There is just too much noise or light around me and I have to go somewhere quiet and dark.

Anxiety – feel a little silly writing this but what I generally mean is a constant fear or feeling of foreboding. Your body being so tense all the time ready to run away or to fight whatever danger you may face.

Lack of appetite – this one is one that I know frustrates the hubby, he will ask what do I fancy for my tea and there really is nothing, I know I am hungry but the thought off food is just too much until the hanger kicks in and just like in the Snickers advert I am possessed by a growling beast that only becomes placid when full.

Feeling of something in your throat – a lump or frog in the throat sensation, which cause you to cough or try to clear it which ultimately leads to a sore throat. I also have either a dry mouth or the feeling of burning in my throat which I have been advised is something called GERD.

Dizziness – I hate this one, no rhyme or reason behind it but the room will shift off axis and it will feel like the floor is coming up to high five my face.

Brain fog – my mental acuity is very damaged on days when I just can’t navigate away from the fog no matter how hard I try.

Back pains – my lower back is now in pieces. The feelings I get when I have a cold is similar to labour pains and leaves my writhing in my bed.

Eczema – I used to battle little patches of eczema as a child but now my knees are the most sore, itchy and red they could ever be, I also now find myself absentmindedly scratching said itches until they bleed.

Disassociation – I will at times just wander off in my mind and stare blankly at the wall, sky, floor etc. This one is hard when I have Charlie by myself and I really have to internally scream at myself to draw me into the here and now. I will have days where and I know this sounds stupid I don’t feel like a person… more like an empty vessel and I really hate those days. They are like my thoughts and feelings are muted with subtitles so I know they are there and what they are but the impact is lost without the volume.

There are many more but I am now feeling very tense and tired so will take advantage of having a sleeping babe for a bit longer and I will go and relax.

Let’s not be disappointed

I have been doing so well recently. Tonight is a different matter and the horrible thing is I don’t have a reason. Anxiety doesn’t need one to completely flatten you down. I have had a long day but had some great social time too so it’s not over exertion. I hate the fact it makes no sense at all. I came home buzzing but within 10 minutes dizziness, sickness fast heart rate and generally feeling of agitation. I had a bath a pint of juice and went to bed. Fast forward 2 hours later and I on the brink of the first major spiral in days…no weeks. I don’t want to be feeling this, I want to sleep as I know my little man will be up early in the morning but I’m just convinced that something is wrong and no matter how hard I fight the feeling each minute is dragging me deeper into the pit.

So I am lying on the sofa in the caravan listening to the beating of the rain battering down on the roof to calm, centre and bring some coziness to me. I just want to be ok.

Low

I am at a low point right now. My sister took Charlie out for a few hours so I ventured down stairs for a change of scenery as I haven’t seen much other than my bedroom walls for the last 2 days. So a day of taking antibiotics every 6 hours and having a narrow window in which I can eat has played havoc already with my IBS and my tummy hurts so much. I am towing the line between ravenous and nauseatingly replete. I’m not sure if it’s the antibiotics or the antidepressants or the lack of nourishment and energy that has the room spinning but I am trying my hardest to circumvent a major spiral about it. My hypochondriac mind is screaming at the top of its voice that there is something else wrong when actually I just need to rest. I just want to feel better and want to be better in every aspect. I want to hug and play with my boy but I can’t and I want to see my hubby again. I guess it’s just hard to mute the worry niggling away at the back of my mind especially when the world keeps changing its axis.