Dh is away and yet again, I'm sinking...

[Ikeatears]

I'm struggling. Again. My brain feels overloaded and I'm so, so tired. The horrible thoughts are back (although they're just thoughts and I have no plans)
Dh is away for a couple of nights with work and even when I'm well, I find it hard but when I feel like this it's just so overwhelming. My plan tomorrow is to take the kids to school then go back to bed. I just want to shut out the world and stop my brain from thinking. I am so terrified that I'm going backwards and that I'll end up in hospital again. I couldn't go back there. They'd have to section me first.
I am a complete failure as a wife and as a mother. I really, truly hate myself.
I'm sinking again aren't I?

You are not a failure.

You are strong for having come this far.
You may feel like you are sinking, but you will not always feel like this, and you WILL rise again.

Stop hating yourself, and look after yourself, be as kind to yourself as you would be to somebody else who was hurting.

I just don't know what to do anymore. I've taken every bit of help on offer, I've engaged completely with MH services, I'm taking my meds, I'm going to the counsellor, I'm phasing back to work and I've even changed my job role to a less stressful position. I'm being honest with my support network about how I feel rather than hiding it and STILL it gets harder not easier.
Soon everyone will be sick of me moaning and being miserable. They'll figure out I'm not the person they thought I was, I never was that person I don't think. Then they'll walk away. Dh couldn't take the stress if I was as ill again. He's got so much to cope with in his job, with the dc and especially with me. I can't put him through again.
I feel like running away

Do you think you can sleep?

Those who love you will NOT get fed up with you and they love you for who you are.

Thoughts are just that - thoughts. Distressing and overwhelming as they can seem, they are not 'fact'. You have control over your thoughts - if sleep is too hard just now, can you distract yourself? TV? Game on your phone? Do your nails?

I've been texting Dh and browsing Mumsnet. I'm just so very weary of the constant battle that I have with myself every day and I feel like I'm letting everyone down. I can't afford to take any more time off work and I can't afford to 'check out' of family life any longer. My dc will have such awful memories of me if I do. They already had to live through months of me being too ill to really leave the house. I feel like screaming, I'm so frustrated and angry and sad and bloody terrified.

You feel bad enough as it is, could you not stop giving yourself a hard time for being ill? Your DCs love you and you love them, that much is clear, and neither one of us know what they may or may not remember about their childhood. They are just as likely to remember a courageous mother battling a horrible disease rather than any kind of 'failure'.

I can't suggest a miracle solution OP, but I can empathise. I've struggled with severe anxiety and depression and my dh works away a lot. It used to be terrified of him being away as I was convinced that he was the only thing keeping me together.

I can tell you that you are not a failure, so many people struggle and few have the courage to admit how they are feeling and accept help, that alone proves your strength.

You are not moaning, you are not well and deserve all the help and support you get. I understand the fear that you are a burden to your DH, I felt the same. But turn it round the other way, what if your DH was ill (because it isn't a choice any more than a physical illness is), you would want to help him because you love him. You wouldn't walk away from someone because of an illness and nor will those around you.

When I couldn't get my brain to turn off I would sleep all day or watch tv all night or just keep walking. Whatever you need to do to get through this crisis is fine, but please keep talking to people.

Please believe that it will get better and be kind to yourself. Sending you much love, which I hope you will accept.

Sending OP as I've been there. Please keep reaching out here and to your DP. It's absolutely healthy to acknowledge that you're anxious and to find ways to take care of yourself and treat yourself gently.

Thank you all so much for replying. I don't feel like I deserve such kindness. I feel selfish and self-absorbed and just pathetic.
I wanted so much to be a good mum and I'm not being the mum I want to be.
The only place in the world that I feel safe is here, at home. I wish I never had to leave or open the door to anyone other than my closest friends. I don't even know why I feel unsafe, I just do. I hate the shaking and the crying and horrible, horrible, pit-of-my-stomach anxiety. How can I live the rest of my life like this? I just want the world to go away and leave me and Dh and the dc here alone, in our safe little bubble.
I really don't deserve them. I've let them all down so badly. I don't think I can ever get over this. It will just keep rearing its head and kicking me when I'm down, time and time again, until one day, I won't get up

I don't feel like I deserve such kindness.

Yes, but that's the illness talking. You do deserve kindness.

And you won't feel like this 'for the rest of your life' - slow down, don't get ahead of yourself, breathe and be nice to yourself.

I just can't see an end to it. I thought I was getting somewhere but I'm slipping back again and I feel like I'll yoyo like this forever. I don't know how to be 'me' anymore. I feel like a nobody, like a shell, I just feel like I've lost every bit of confidence that I ever had and I don't know how to get it back

Hello Ikea I know you've been struggling for several months and hated hospital so much. I know what everyone is saying is true but I have very similar feelings to you, feeling I'm letting people down, that people are fed up with me, I'm not the grandmother I want to be, DP has had enough of me etc etc. I honestly think they are symptoms of depression because we don't feel those things when we are physically ill. My CPN told me they are symptoms as is the notion that we are never going to get better.

You have a supportive DH I know - same here - and for that we must be thankful. I don't know what else to say - mental illness is a torment - sucks all the pleasure out of life and turns us into crying jabbering wrecks. You're a young woman (whereas I'm not) and you have every chance of getting better and what you are going through now will just be a distant memory.

Duvet day tomorrow sounds about right.

OP, of course you deserve kindness, you are a person who is unhappy, everyone deserves kindness and empathy, and from what you have posted you give a lot of those values out to other people.

I'm not a Mum, but I learnt a lot from mine, she was physically very frail, but I knew she loved me and that was the most important thing. From what I know of kids they are great at seeing the truth in things. If Mummy isn't feeling well, she needs love, just like you give them. Being unwell does not make you a bad Mum and you haven't let anyone down.

Anxiety is the worst feeling in the world and it is so hard to describe it to those who haven't been there. There are times when you are so overwhelmed it can feel like it will never feel any better, I can promise you that you can.

Please be kind to yourself, when it is too hard, it's too hard, tell somebody. Take all the help on offer and don't for one second feel bad about it. It's for you, your DH and your DC's. Imagine one of your friends was telling you what you are telling us now and what you would say to them, I bet it's a lot kinder than what you are telling yourself.

Thanks Nana, I saw a post of yours earlier where you said you were struggling. It's just so exhausting isn't it. I'm sorry you feel rubbish too. Did you decide against ECT? I've heard of 3 people who I know who had it and they all found it very effective but it's a scary thought isn't it.
I can't go back to hospital, I just can't. I actually think I'd rather die. It felt like a punishment, not care and treatment. I just can't go back there. Why is nothing helping? Poor Dh, stuck in a hotel room miles away, worrying whether I'll make it out of bed to take the kids to school or whether I'll melt down further and my thoughts will become solid plans. I'm putting him through so much

Smurfing, I know in my rational mind that you're right but I don't believe it, if that makes sense. I can't see how anyone could ever love me. I'm not loveable. I'm just a shell of a person, plodding through the days. I'm wasting the perfectly good life I've been given.
I wish I'd had a mum like yours. I don't feel like I've ever truly been anyone's child.

Hey Ikea,

Sounds like you're having a pretty shitty time tonight. It's amazing how the bloody illness can override rational thoughts isn't it? It never ceases to amaze me how my brain can cause me so much trauma sometimes.

I remember those feelings well, and how I would mentally try to push away everyone I loved because I was terrified they would leave me because I didn't believe anyone I loved would stay. Most people would say I've had a privileged life and I used to feel so guilty that I was ill, not being able to accept that illness isn't a choice and can affect anyone.

You may not feel like you've been anyones child, but you've certainly worked out how to be a Mum from somewhere, because your love and concern for your DC's shines through in your posts. I'm sure when they grow up they will be able to tell the same story I do, that their Mum loved them.

I have to go to bed now, so sorry to leave you. Please take care of yourself.

Thanks Smurfing. I actually fell asleep, meds finally kicked in I think. Well, I'm up and kids are dressed and I'm dressed so I suppose it's another morning I've managed to drag myself out of bed.

Please be kind to yourself today ikea. It is good weather for a duvet day if you need one!

I'll try, although I've just reversed into a car in a car park. Luckily, the other driver was lovely and said there was no damage. Not even looked at my car.
There's so much I should be doing around the house but I just want to crawl back to bed

Don't worry OP, we've all done something like that. I'm glad the other driver was lovely. It sounds like it wasn't too serious if there was no damage.

Don't worry about house stuff if you're not up to it - you need to be kind to yourself. I heard someone on here say that we need to treat ourselves like small children at times - make sure we feed and settle ourselves in the way we need rather than rushing from one thing to another.

Op, Ive been lurking a bit and seen some of your threads. My mum had anxiety her whole life. She also had ocd and was a heavy drinker. She was also an amazing mum, a respected professional and beautiful soul, the best mum anyone could have. I only look back on her with the greatest love, respect and admiration and my one regret for her was that she did not have more support and often couldn't see how amazing she was. I wish she had seen how amazingly she was doing in the face of some quite massive problems.
I suffer from anxiety, and an eating disorder myself and feel really guilty about my family. I am returning to work on Monday after a lengthy absence due to a medical condition and haven't been honest that I also suffered a breakdown in August, lucky timing that both things happened at once.
You have my utmost respect for going back to work and for being open about how you are feeling. It sounds trite, but you can rise again, this is only temporary. You are doing amazingly and i wish you could be a bit kinder to yourself.

Geraldine, thank you, your post made me cry. (Not in a bad way). I only hope my children can feel the same way about me. I just had so many plans to be the parent I feel I didn't have. I had some MH issues during my teens and early twenties but when dc1 was born, they were the happiest 3 years of my life. I knew that whatever else I was, I was a good mum and he was my entire world. I think I had pnd after dc2 and things have never truly been the same ever since. I don't seem to be able to enjoy motherhood and life in general in the same way that I did during those lovely 3 years.
I am lying on the sofa staring at all the (clean, folded) clothes that need putting away but I can't make myself do it. I've actually taken quetiapine because I can't handle of full day of crippling anxiety and even if it doesn't take it away, it'll make drowsy enough to get some sleep. Oh I could cry with the futility of it all, I really could. So tired and fed up.

It is exhausting, does seem futile and also never ending. I wouldn't say I know how you feel, as that can never be true, but I think those words are very apt when in the midst of a low. I am crippled by anxiety about work approaching. However, not every day can be a good one and even something as simple as posting here about how you are feeling, is, in my opinion, a positive thing. I am trying to embrace the idea that we are all flawed in some way and that there is no such thing as 'normal'. It's really helping me not to feel like I am failing it everything. Have a rest and maybe a sleep and see if you feel a tiny bit better after.

I just wanted to add that from my experience children who grow up in a loving family but with a bit more responsibility and more understanding of other people grow up to be the most caring and successful people. It really is a big achievement that you can get them up, dressed off to school and then fed in an evening. As long as you can keep doing that, your doing great.

Please go back to your GP, maybe it's time for a medication review, you need something to help and support you before you sink to the point of hospital treatment xx

Thank you so much for your replies. I've just been floored by the quetiapine. If forgotten how much a day time dose knocks me out. I've had to force myself awake and I've come into the garden to have a cigarette to try to 'sober' up. I'd also forgotten about the vivid dreams. I've just looked back on my previous post and I've actually only been asleep half an hour! I know I'm playing about with these meds and I've got to stop. My prescription actually says 50mg twice a day but there is NO WAY I could go to work after taking it in a morning. I really need to sort a new gp and have a review. Can't face the forms though